Team Terraforce
by godofmadness43
Summary: Team Terraforce, a group of kids from Earth, stolen from their homes, forced to fight in a death game to survive. Here is the tale of these group of friends, who fought numerous enemies, uncovered ancient artifacts, and uncovered a conspiracy that shook the very foundations of the universe to its core. This is their story...
1. Beginning

**Well, to all my fans who have waited patiently for an update, thank you. Firstly I know its been a while and people are wondering about my DOA fan fiction, well, that's on a temporary hiatus till I get this up and running. Secondly I've had a bad writer's block, when I got the mood to write, I ended up making this. Well, this is the Soul Caliber sequel everyone wanted, enjoy it I guess.**

**Oh right, disclaimer, ok, first: I do not own Ben 10 or Ratchet & Clank, they belong to Man of Action and Insomniac respectively, all I do own are the characters and planets that are original, anyway...here we go!**

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><p><strong>Team Terraforce<strong>

"_You wanna hear my story? Heh, alright, I'll tell you. I mean, you know my story, you saw the news and the episodes, right? You saw what we went through, but that's not enough huh? You wanna hear how we fought through all that shit, uncovered secrets better left buried, and exposed the dark side of mankind, huh? Alright, sit back and relax, because it didn't start in a arena cell, no, it started…in a simple bedroom one morning…"_

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><p><strong>Prologue: Not on Earth Anymore (Beginning)<strong>

_The smell of charcoal and ashes hung in the air, a loud crash was heard through the destroyed streets, smoke rose from the crater, blocking out the green flash of energy as the occupant slowly stumbled out, the brown hair disheveled, clothes tattered and skin covered in scratches. The teen collapsed on the ground, arm outstretched, revealing a white and green futuristic watch on his wrist._

_An armored boot stepped next to the watch, a gauntleted hand grabbed his wrist, hoisting up the boy's body like a war trophy. A horn blast echoed through the destroyed city, the fires of the crashed ship illuminated the man and his trophy as another horn blast echoed._

"**Today…this world BURNS!"** _he bellowed loudly as the view shot out into the atmosphere of the planet, showing the blue planet engulfed in fire while ships were busy bombarding the surface._

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><p>I gasped from the nightmare, shuddering from it, the cold feeling of dread was clung to me like the blanket I had over my form. I panted and sighed, waiting for the feeling to pass, I felt the sunlight hit my face, checking my cell phone I saw it was 11:43 a.m. and yawned, resting my head for a few minutes as I began to come to my senses. I looked and rubbed my eyes, hearing the sounds of the TV on in the living room and figured my mom was up. Oh I never really introduced myself, name's Mark, I'm a human from Earth just like everyone else, today I was preparing to do what I normally do, the same old routine.<p>

Sure I mean I could get a job and such, be active in my community, but what's the point? Yes I am lazy, yes I am bored and I don't want to change, I like being me, but I hate this world, its limiting, its noisy, and the people, well least from what I hear on the news, it's just messed up, I wouldn't even care if I left this rock and never came back.

Boy was I about to eat those words…

A half-an-hour later I finished my morning ritual of breakfast, brushing my teeth; I looked and turned my Xbox 360 on, smiling as I decided to kill some hours by playing some games. After loading up I looked and chose the game _Bastion_ and smiled to myself as I began playing. After several hours of playing I was bored, logged off, probably skipping out on talking to any of my friends, then looked at the time, seeing it was three o'clock, I figured time to check our mail.

I got up, not changing out of my casual clothes; our mailbox was nearby, a few minutes out into the sunlight and a quick walk to the box and back. Simple enough, I grabbed the key, getting out, hearing my dog bark as I climbed down the stairs. "I'll be back!" I tell her as I head down the gravel walkway from our house.

I felt the humid air on my skin, pale from lack of sunlight, making me pass for white, or Arabic white, even though I'm Hispanic, everyone confused me for another nationality, must be my beard, I really should shave more often. I kept thinking, about the state of humanity, of Ben 10, the so called hero everyone talked about. I only saw bits but ever since it was revealed aliens existed, I was curious and excited, I wanted to meet some, I wanted to see their worlds, know what it was like living there. But I sighed, I can't leave this world, I got family and friends…but the temptation to ditch it all was strong.

I get my mail and sigh, no new games for me sadly, but new magazine at least, so light reading, sweet.

I look around, light clouds in the sky, the blue sky healthy despite lack of ozone layer in certain spots, hot air of summer, yeah just a typical day in the neighborhood. However, that wasn't the case, as I heard a loud humming and felt the ground shaking and heard the dogs from the neighborhood were barking. I was staring at a spaceship twenty times bigger than a three story building…with lots of weapons on its sides, hovering in the skyline, blocking out the afternoon sun.

The spaceship opened up and a few robots fell out of the hatch and onto the ground with a loud crashing sound, setting off car alarms and causing dogs to bark louder. I saw the robots transform and stand on their legs, they had crimson paint and a logo of some weird horned…thing with a 'Z' behind it. I soon saw the nearest robot's eyes glow as they looked at me. I felt nothing but dread from those cold glowing eyes, my feet were planted on the ground until one unveiled a rifle looking weapon and aimed it at me.

"Oh shit!" I yelled and dodged the laser fire and made a break for our house, since some of the robots landed outside it. I panted heavily, hot air and lack of exercise made my muscles so weak. I panted and soon saw the robots were trying to enter the neighbors' houses, all searching for something. I heard yells, but I didn't bother listening as I made my way to the front door, making sure that the doors were locked and went to turn the knob.

As soon as I touched the doorknob I heard a loud beep and got flung back by a force of wind that sent me flying and crashing into a tree. I gasped and crumbled, back hurting, the pain…god it hurts so much! "C…Chris! M…Mom! Mommy!" I called, childhood antics flashing and taking over, my right arm felt like it burned, something was wedged into parts of my body, I can't see too well. I saw a silhouette of someone, something human shaped coming close to me, it looked at me, my eyes watered in pain, I couldn't see well, but I saw one thing.

A pair of yellow eyes stared blankly at me, they seemed…familiar almost.

"Sleep…sleep little pup…" the eyes spoke before something smashed against my face and I blacked out.

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><p>"<em>Take them all, burn the house…"<em>

"_No, this wasn't part of the deal!"_

"_It is now…"_

_The sounds of buzzing electronics were heard as soon as the boy slipping into consciousness. Everything was black; the sounds of welding, buzzing, zapping, drilling and clanking were heard. A few voices are heard and soon something appeared on a monitor, it was a face, but it was hard to tell what it was. The monitor moved down to show some sort of material for something. _

_A click and a wince of pain caused a groan of pain to escape from the helmet, with the voices all frantically yelling and a fourth yelling and screaming in pain from something. A beeping sound repeatedly pulsed, going faster and faster as the boy looked around, scared. He called out names, he called for his family, anyone to help, he said things, called them monsters, asking where he was. The boy suddenly felt something injected inside of him and he calmed down. He soon heard another voice, faint, but it was definitely English. _

"_Easy there! We need the boy alive, we can't have him die on his first day now can we?" the voice asked in a soft tone as the monitor went black. The boy soon felt metal being placed on his body, followed by a tingling feeling before he was put to sleep._

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><p><strong>Mark's POV<strong>

I soon began to regain consciousness after my "experimentation" and soon I saw something flash on my screen…wait, what? I was looking through an orange tinted visor and looked at my hands, they were metal, and I was wearing some kind of body suit or armor that was dark blue and grey, I saw my helmet in a reflection and it looked…well…human looking, kinda like a gladiator helmet and hid my face behind a tinted visor.

Sweet this is just like a video game!

I soon heard a buzzing sound in my helmet, god that noise! Make it top! I yelled and banged on it to try and turn it off; instead I heard someone's voice.

"_Mar...K…Mark…Mark, can you hear me?"_ the voice asked through the static.

"Joseph? Joe is that you?" I asked frantically, grateful for the familiar voice of my friend.

"_Good, I got through to you, listen, we got abducted by some guys working for a game called Dreadzone Z, it's apparently this illegal underground gladiator game were people fight each other to survive, seems like some other people got abducted and are coming to you as we speak,"_ Joseph explained. I was going to ask Joseph what was going on when two small pillars of light appeared beside me.

I looked to my right and saw a tall figure wearing black and red body armor like mine, only his helmet looked like a Spartan helmet and it had a red visor. The pillar of light to my left faded and I saw someone wearing dark yellow and green armor and he looked like he had the same helmet like mine.

"What—what the hell?! Where are we? Who are you two?" one of the men in the armor asked me and the other guy.

"Wait a minute…Zach? Is that you?" I asked the boy in the black and red armor, astounded.

The man stopped and stared at me, then looked me over and, if the visor wasn't tinted, I could've sworn he was grinning. "Mark? Dude, what happened, and when did we get this cool looking armor?" Zach asked while looking over his armor.

"Don't know, but who are you?" I asked the guy on my left.

"Mark, it's me, John, remember?" the man stated.

"Ooh…hey dude," I said casually after realizing my mistake. How can I be so casual right now? Well…I play a lot of video games, so this kind of shit isn't new to me, I've seen it so many times to other people…and now I'm living it…mother fuck I am screwed.

"Where are we?" John asked me once I snapped back to reality.

"I don't know, but I know one thing: We're not on Earth anymore," I muttered obviously.

"You're on Dreadzone Z, the most popular gladiatorial sport in the entire sector," a voice responded to John's question. A large monitor flew in front of the three and soon the monitor turned on. On the screen was a man that looked much like a lion, with a large dark gold mane with black lines in them, beady black eyes, and fur on his face, muzzle and paws, which only had three fingers, odd yet cool. He was wearing a red, orange and mahogany suit with the same logo I saw on the robots on his left breast pocket and a nametag that read "Director" on the right.

"Welcome contestants of Earth, I am the Director of Dreadzone Z, Alistair Blackwell, and I am here to welcome you, along with your team, to Dreadzone Z. Here you and your team shall fight to the death against a horde of other gladiators from this side of the galaxy to the next, if you survive and defeat my personal Exterminators and my army of robots and killer aliens, you might be able to go home in glory, if not…well, we'll be sure to have a moment of silence in your honor," Alistair explained in an obnoxious yet gentle tone to his voice.

Somehow, I highly think they want us dead. The screen shut off and before us was a large arena like area.

"_This is a practice arena to hone your skills before you can fight in the Battledome, also, check out your weapons,"_ Joseph instructed. I looked at my hands and saw that I was holding a pair of pistols that were red and orange and black that looked like they didn't need a cartridge for ammo. I soon realized these pistols were called the Dual Vipers (according to what my visor had said when it looked over the weapons…and the fact it had the name pained on the hilts of the guns) and twirled them (to the best of my ability, which wasn't that good). Zach was holding a huge gun that looked like it could demo an entire room in seconds the Magma Cannon while John was holding a futuristic wrench…wow, looking at what we Humans have to work within the wrench department, we're basically hillbillies to these guys.

"Aww man, I wanted the pistols," Zach whined when he saw me holding the Dual Vipers.

"How about we trade?"

"Deal," he said and we switched guns.

"Oh yeah, I feel the power," I grinned and cocked the Magma Cannon wickedly.

"_Come on you three, you need to finish the Qualifier course in time if you want us to survive out here so we can get back home!"_ Joseph said through the intercom in our helmets. Wait…then that the hell are we doing here?!

"Heh, right, let's go!" I smirked and ran ahead with the others following, excited and feeling adrenaline coursing in my veins. I jumped and suddenly did a flip as I landed on a ledge in front of me that lead to another floor.

"Wow, looks like these suits can enhance our bodies to inhuman levels," I stated as the others came up beside me.

"Dude these suits are awesome!" John said enthusiastically and punched a hole in the wall, leaving a dent in it.

"Come on, let's go blow up stuff," Zach said and ran ahead of us. I sighed and followed him, but I felt adrenaline rush into my body as some robots, who I think were the training dummies, popped up from some sort of transporter and aimed their guns at us. My visor suddenly lit up and soon started scanning them, the schematics and portfolio appeared for the robots, labeling them "DZZ- Strikers".

"Oh shit, watch out!" I yelled and ran for cover as the robots shot at us. Zach however fired his Dual Vipers at the robots and after a few shots they were nothing but scrap metal.

"Nice one!" I yelled as Zach twirled the guns.

"I love these things," he said with a grin as bolts came and went inside his suit. I grinned and saw some more enemies before us, deciding to test out some skills in FPS games I've played, I pulled out the Magma cannon and let loose. Streams of the energy from the weapon shot out of the gun and at the groups of enemies, destroying a few of them in one shot.

I looked at the Magma cannon and marveled at its raw destructive power and soon saw a meter on the right side of my screen appear and saw it was rising in numbers and it had a bolt icon next to it.

"_Those bolts act as currency here, you can use them to buy weapons and ammo, and upgrades as well, and they can also be exchanged for other forms of currency, like credits"_ Joseph explained to us. Looking at the bolt counter on my HUD, I had the idea of converting this into money, figuring they might fetch a price back home, maybe even be able to help my family.

"Thanks for the tip Joe," I said. The three of us continued through a tunnel and soon ended up in some kind of arena that had a roof, a large monitor on the wall with the Dreadzone Z logo and some barricades, some kind of teleporter in the corner, and some weird crates that were dark yellow. Before I could say anything, some more DZZ-Strikers popped up along with some weird floating ball things with orange dots on the plating.

The balls opened up and soon razor blades appeared from the compartments and they zoomed at us. I shot some more rounds with my Magma Cannon while Zach fired the Dual Vipers in conjunction. The balls soon exploded from the combined firepower, while the strikers all shot at us, some damaged from the magma cannon blasts, and a few got their heads popped off by the Dual vipers. In a matter of minutes the entire group of robots were gone and bolts were coming into our suits, raising our bolt meters like crazy.

"I must say I'm impressed with you humans," Alistair said as he popped up on the monitor on the wall, freaking us all out.

"By now you probably noticed the Dreadlock collars on your necks, unless you were too stupid to notice until now," Alistair mumbled, "These collars are put there so we can be able to keep you all in check, if you decide to go against the rules of Dreadzone Z, you will receive a 'mildly' painful shock," Alistair said. We then saw two robots, one of them muttering "God this sucks…" before getting shocked and landing on the floor.

Oh my god...this is wrong…

"If you should prove annoying or worse, _boring_ to audience members, the collars will also explode to appeal to viewers," Alistair said. The robot next to the one that got shocked waved at us before its head got blown up by the collar and fell to the ground headless.

The three of us were, needless to say, shocked by this. So if I complain on air I get blown up, if I'm boring I blow up, if I disobey then I get shocked and possibly blown up later or worse…yeah we're screwed. "Now then, since you three survived the training course, you can now go and meet up with your little friends, if you manage to survive the qualifying round of Dreadzone Z, then we might have use of you, if not…well you know," Alistair grinned at us and the screen returned to the logo.

"Man, this both rocks and sucks," John said when Blackwell vanished from the screen.

"Come on, let's go meet with Joseph and the others and find out what the fuck is going on," I said and looked around for a teleporter. I soon found one at the right corner of the area and we walked towards it. As soon as we stepped on it we were suddenly engulfed by light and I knew we were being transported to where Joseph and the others were.

I hope finding them we can all escape this hellhole intact, or…at least most of us.

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><p><strong>Well, there we go, first chapter, after so much preparing, I'm finally posting this, I still got the rest of the story penned in advanced, just let me re-edit it and I'll get them posted soon. Anyway to all my fans, thanks for the patience, I hope this story becomes your favorite.<strong>


	2. First Fight

**Ok here's chapter 1...well 2 if you count the prologue. Anyway, I changed the story to X-over, but still kept the Ben 10 tag, you'll see why soon. and first off, yes there will be characters from Ben 10 and Ratchet and Clank, they'll show up soon. Also this is crossing over lots of games and anime I've seen and caught interest in. An example would ruin the story, but yeah, you'll find influences from several games and stuff. **

**Oh also, I'm gonna try to portray a more...realistic approach to Ben 10, since one of the gripes of Omniverse I saw was how people reacted to stuff like living with aliens but freaking out when they discovered Undertown, and how Ben forgot many things from the other series, also aspects from Ultimate Alien and Alien Force I'm keeping, like Primus. You'll find out why later, anyway enjoy the chapter! Also disclaimer again: I don't know ben 10, ratchet and clank nor any of the anime and games referenced in this fanfic, they belong to their creators. the things I own are my characters and species, anyway enjoy.**

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><p><strong>Chapter 1: The Qualifier Round (First Fight)<strong>

The guys and I soon found ourselves out of the light and our mouths dropped when we saw where we were.

"Holy Shit…" we said unanimously. What we saw was a…actually; nothing could describe what we were seeing. All I can really say was there was a huge station with space in the background, a bunch of machinery and apartments that seemed it could house thousands of people, maybe some of Earth if they could make the trip, and several large arena-like places in the distance. We saw cars flying by in straight lines and a huge dock for a large cargo ship that loomed over the area.

"Wow…this place is frigging awesome!" John exclaimed.

"Hell yeah…" I muttered as I looked around.

"Hey guys!" I heard a familiar voice call. We turned and saw our friend, Joseph, sitting on a chair in front of some monitors. Joseph was a kid around our age of 19, but he was much younger than he looked, with dark skin, brown eyes, not much hair, and was wearing a green shirt with two buttons, jeans, and sneakers. He too had the dreadlock collar around his neck like us. I also noticed that he didn't have his crutches and that there was some machinery on his right leg for some reason, either he got new cyber implants in his leg or they amputated his leg and gave him that one to compensate.

"Hey Joe, mind telling me why you have machinery on your leg, or did you decide to augment yourself?" I asked him.

"This? Oh, apparently when I was knocked out those aliens operated on my leg and fixed it, the machines are there temporarily until my leg gets better," Joseph replied. I looked at the mechanical implements on his leg, I was glad he could walk again…but still…I was kind of used to seeing him with his crutches.

"So Joe, anyone else we know working with us?" John asked him.

"Yeah, over there Frankie is working with someone else on mechanics," Joseph said and pointed to a station along the second jutting walkway. I really couldn't see without my glasses, plus this helmet was making it hard to breathe.

"ARGH! How can you get these things off?! I'm suffocating in this thing!" I yelled as I tried to yank off my helmet. I soon felt my finger press on a button and my helmet opened up, allowing me to breathe in fresh air.

"Aah…man that feels good…" I said with a sigh. Zach and John both found the button and their helmets opened. Zach had brown hair with blonde highlights while John had brown hair and glasses like me.

"Man it's hard to breathe with those things on," John gasped.

"Aah, that's much better," Zach sighed.

"Hey Mark!" Frankie called when he saw us. Frankie was a kid a year younger than us; he had brown hair that was a little shaggy, glasses, and was wearing a dark blue shirt and jeans with a dreadlock collar around his neck. This guy is also one of my friends, a fellow anime enthusiast like me and everyone I know, also he's smart and imaginative too, like me. I wonder though how did they get here? Did they get kidnapped too?

"Hey dude," I replied casually, hiding the questions I wanted to ask for now.

"Glad to see we're all ok" Frankie said optimistically.

"Dudes, looks like we're all here," I smirked happily.

"We need Scott though," Zach replied somberly.

"What we need is to get out of here, I've been seeing a bunch of aliens around here and they don't look happy," Frankie replied nervously.

"Wait, 'aliens' like those Grays or 'aliens' like in Ben 10 uses?" I asked, wanting clarification so I didn't sound like a jerk.

"Ben 10"

"Yeah we're dead," I said flatly. For those wondering why I asked, I saw Ben 10 on the news, like a lot, and seeing him changing to all those aliens, I thought they were cool. So all those aliens he can turn into are actually different species in the universe...huh, interesting.

Soon the screen in front of us came to life and Alistair appeared.

"Alright you meatbags listen up, you're up next in the Battledome after the last contestant is finished, and with the way he's fighting he might not last a few more seconds, now go out there and fight," Alistair declared, "Oh and here's something for your troubles," he added as the screen went black again. Suddenly a small floating robot holding a trap appeared and on it was a weapon that looked an awful lot like a sniper rifle.

"Sweet," John said as he picked up the rifle, which my visor soon scanned and labeled as the Fusion Rifle.

"So how long until that shuttle picks us up Joseph? I am kinda getting hungry" I asked Joseph while rubbing my stomach.

"In a few minutes, maybe 30 or something," he replied with a shrug.

"I'm hungry," Zach replied rubbing his stomach hungrily.

"Yeah me too, anywhere we can get some grub?" I asked Joe again, my hunger showing, I never got to eat lunch back home.

"There's a mess hall nearby you can use," he replied sitting in the chair that was surrounded by a bunch of monitors.

"Cool, want us to bring you anything?" I asked him.

"Sandwich would be nice," Joseph replied.

"Cool, be right back," I said and the three of us went to the mess. When we got there, I was surprised by the fact there where aliens of different species, some I recognized as being the aliens Ben Tennyson uses, just...different looking, more...primal. Some of the aliens looked at us and I was sure they knew, or thought, we'd be dead soon.

"Humans…here in Dreadzone? Guess Alistair wants these chumps to compete," a Galvanic Mechromorph muttered.

"I bet'cha they'll be dead in the first round," a Tetramand muttered.

We ignored their comments and saw a line of aliens in front of a chute-like thing. One of the aliens muttered something in its language and soon some…green thing materialized and the alien took it. I looked at the guys and motioned Zach to go in front of me, to test it out first.

Zach went up first and said, "Can I have a cheeseburger with fries and a coke?" and then his food appeared from the opening. I looked at John and we both nodded, and then ordered our meals. We sat by a table together, I had a bacon double cheeseburger with a chocolate milkshake, and John had a sandwich with ham, bologna, Swiss cheese, lettuce, and some other stuff, along with a soda.

We began to eat our lunches…or breakfasts…or, you know what I mean! Anyway, when we were finished the doors opened and the other gladiators suddenly began to mutter.

"Out of the way! Champs coming through!" a loud, gruff voice yelled. We turned and saw some more aliens coming towards the line. One of them looked like a volcano-like creature with a cone on his head, another was a…I had no idea what the fuck he was…he didn't look human…he looked more like a blob or a Upgrade like creature with eyes (like Goop from _Ben 10: Alien Force_ only the size of a human). The third was some kinda robot thing we fought in the training center, only with more bulk, and the fourth was…a werewolf…holy freaking shit, it's a werewolf!

The Loboan was just like any regular werewolf, but he had a scar on his cheek with the middle slash ending at the top of his right eye, speaking of his right eye, both of them were light orange in color. The other gladiators backed off as the champs ordered their food and sat down at a table in the corner.

"You hear? Alistair got some newbies from Earth," the volcano guy said.

"Earth? It has no significance to Dreadzone, why would he take some people from there?" the machine asked.

The blob creature placed a hand on the volcano man's shoulder and said volcano man nodded in a silent agreement.

"Wait, there are some here?" he asked. The blob nodded and pointed in our direction, causing their eyes to look at ours.

"Heh, they don't look so tough, in fact I'd say one of them is about to faint," the volcano man smirked. The others were looking at the Loboan, who was still looking at me for some reason. He then turned to the others.

"Something up?" the Volcano man asked.

"…the boy…he…he reminds me of…" the Loboan began.

"_Attention Team Terraforce, please report to the shuttle for the Battledome qualification round," _the intercom said. I looked at Zach and John, "Guess that's us," I said. They nodded and we threw our food in the trash before we headed back to our containment area. We soon arrived and saw a shuttle waiting for us.

"Alright, ready guys?" I asked them.

"Yeah," Zach said.

"Let's do this, John replied. I nodded with them and got into the shuttle, it was small, and it had a bench and a monitor on the wall with the Dreadzone Z logo on it. The door soon shut and we felt it heading to the Battledome, and our fight.

"_Greetings Contestant or Contestants, and welcome to Dreadzone Z. Here you will have to fight various other teams in various events, such as a fighting someone on the battlefield or running an obstacle course. If you can survive the campaign planets, you are eligible to fight in the Exterminators in the Tournament rounds and become Number 1. Please enjoy your stay in Dreadzone, and may the best species win." _That's what a robot on the monitor said to us as we were heading to the Battledome. I've played the game, and now I'm living it…God please help us…

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><p>Back on Earth, while some people were busy dealing with the disappearances of people, the TVs and monitors around the world suddenly stopped. When they began to work again, they showed a list of channels with a voice saying "Humans of earth, your cable is now being connected to the Universal Cable Network…" along with, "Enjoy your species fight for their lives on this season's episode of Dreadzone Z…"<p>

"Dreadzone Z? Wonder what's that?" someone at a diner asked.

"What did he mean when he said "fight for their lives"?" someone asked. The screen soon showed the live feed from the Battledome as everyone around the world watched.

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><p>In the Battledome, thousands of screaming fans are cheering their heads off as they see the last combatant being killed by a robot warrior gang. In the commentator's stand, this is floating above the action; two people sit in chairs facing a camera. One of them is a well-built man with a black mullet, a navy blue business suit, and light red skin and brown eyes. Next to him is a woman with red finger-wave hair, blue eyes, and has steely grey-blue skin.<p>

"Well well, seems like that last combatant lasted longer than most others in the preliminaries, eh Josh?" the woman asked.

"You said it Joanne, and it looks like our next contestants are…" Josh looks at the paper he's holding, squinting to try and read the small text on it, then grabbed some glasses and began reading, "Humans? Eh, works for me," he shrugged and tossed the papers and glasses aside. "and here they come now!" Josh said as the shuttle carrying the three combatants appeared, lowering to the ground before opening up, revealing the humans.

"Wow…I never knew they'd be like this," Josh said with a little surprise as he watched the three kids walk out. "they're just kids!" he exclaimed.

"Yes, I think one of them is part Loboan…or is he just naturally hairy?" Joanne wondered.

"I'm naturally hairy!" Mark called to the commentators.

"Well that answers that question…wait seriously?" Josh called back to Mark.

"Yeah, it's from my family, long story," Mark replied.

"…well I really don't want to know just how hairy these humans are, but if they fight better than that other guy, that's good," Josh said casually.

"Enough with the small talk, let's get ready for the carnage!" Joanne yelled as the fans cheered.

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><p>"Did you really have to tell them about your hair?" Zach asked in a low tone.<p>

"Shut up Zach" I grumbled and flipped my helmet on, I tend not to think things through a lot, and already I was regretting saying I come from a hairy family, but seriously, me a Loboan? Nah, no way could I be one. We soon saw a bunch of robots appear and soon fired our weapons. I never felt an adrenaline rush like this, man, as much as they wanted us to die, this was awesome! I soon saw some drop ships appear and start dropping off more robots.

"Drop ships over there, light it up!" I said through our radios and we began to fire at one of them, destroying it in a few combined shots. John was busy shooting from a distance with the Fusion Rifle, while Zach and I were firing up close with the Dual Vipers and Magma Cannon, which were already leveled up to Level 2 due to the enemies we've been killing, plus there was a little bar that was underneath the weapon icon on my HUD that slowly inched closer to the other end.

As soon as the robots were gone, the arena, covered in an orange liquid (which I realized when I saw metal parts of a robot fall in and dissolve was acid), sprouted more platforms from under the liquid, leading to a tunnel out of the area. we made our way down the tunnel, destroying more robots and earning a shitload of bolts, and soon made it to another arena. This one was larger and had two platforms separated by a sea of orange acidic lava. More robots appeared and we were beginning to lose some ammo, thankfully there were ammo crates from the tunnel and right before us.

So we continued to fight, dodge, but when my Magma cannon ran out of ammo, I soon realized I was screwed...or was I?

"Shit…Zach let me borrow one of your Vipers!" I said to my friend.

"A little busy here!" He called and shot another robot.

"John?" I asked him.

"Can't dude, am a little busy here," John said as I saw him whack some robots with his wrench. Oh shit I'm screwed…ok no ammo and I don't got any melee weapons to defend myself, shit I am so screwed! I soon saw a robot armed with a wrench and ducked to avoid it's swing.

"Guys! Help!" I said through the radio.

_"Grr, hang on man, got to get rid of this mother-"_ I didn't hear the rest as one of the robots suddenly decked me in the face and I fell in pain.

"Ouch, that had to hurt," Josh cringed while Joanne was on the edge of her seat.

"Ooh this is good, he's going to die!" she said excitingly.

I heard a ringing noise as I struggled to stay stable, my head was so dizzy from the blow as the world was spinning around me, but I did see the robot about ready to kill me just as my world began to refocus. I widened my eyes in shock and fear as the DZZ-Striker was going to kill me with the wrench. I suddenly felt a weird presence in my body, like my body wasn't in control of my actions.

I dodged the wrench with a roll and everything around my eyes corner began to blur as I suddenly appeared before the robot, grabbed the wrench and smashed it against his head, then I grabbed the head, smashed it against my knee (ow! by the way), bashed it with the butt of it's wrench and kicked it into the other mob of robots, much to everyone's (including my) surprise.

"Whoa…" I gasped once I got control.

"Whoa…" Zach and John said.

"Whoa…" Josh said with surprise.

"Whoa…" Everyone said.

"When could he do that?" Joseph asked as they watched the fight on the Holovision.

"Don't know…but that was awesome," Frankie said with a grin.

I panted as I regain my composure, what the fuck was that about? Guess all those years playing video games finally paid off!

"What the hell was that about?" John asked when he came up to me.

"Don't ask me, I don't even know," I replied holding the wrench.

"Hey guys, we can talk later after we beat this course," Zach said. I nodded, cocking my Magma Cannon, and ran ahead into the fray. A few minutes later we emerged as winners of the Qualifying round.

"Well, that was an eventful round eh Joanne?" Josh asked.

"Yeah, but that Earth boy with the moustache…when could he fight like that?" Joanne wondered.

"Don't know, but those other two are just as good, seems like Dreadzone Z will be more interesting now with these guys around eh?" Josh asked.

"If you're trying to flirt with me, it's not working," Joanne said and caused Josh to face-fault.

"Well, that's all for this time folks, I'm Josh the Smasher,"

"And I'm Joanne Nighthawk,"

"And this is Dreadzone Z," Both said.

* * *

><p>In Alistair's office, overlooking the arena the team just fought in, the Director was watching the broadcast with the other four Exterminators.<p>

"Well?" He asked the Volcano man.

"Those kids sure are good…for amateurs at best" the Vesuvian said with a cocky smirk.

"Hmm…interesting, that Mark kid sure can scrap in a fight, not as good as you Fenrir…" The robot said to the wolf alien, who was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. Fenrir only looked at him with one eye opened, but when he saw the screen his ears perked up.

"That boy… Fenrir mumbled.

"We'll meet at the mess, alright?" the volcano man called.

Fenrir nodded with a huff and stared at the screen more, showing the Terraforce leader in full high-resolution view. The others looked at him strangely, with Alistair getting something, a sheet of papers and looked through them.

"Hmm…we should keep an eye of those humans…" he said. The other Exterminators agreed and went off to their suite. Alistair sat in his chair and looked at the video feed again. "Hmm…that boy…I wonder…" he muttered.

* * *

><p><strong>Meanwhile...<strong>

Amidst the arena spectators that populated the stands, a lone figure sat in a bench, watching the team win their first match. "those boys are good, but they'll need more help if they want to win..." he muttered as he vanished, the alien next to where the man was had turned, expecting the man to be there, but wasn't there, scaring the alien.

The man soon appeared again, this time on the outskirts of a small city, the city being made of buildings resembling mushrooms with little ponds scattered around. the only thing of value was the large tower overlooking the town. The man looked up and began walking, passing by many of the Galvans busy doing their daily routines while he went to the tower.

"Halt!" a armored Galvan wearing a jetpack said as he flew to the man's hidden face. "identify yourself!" he declared.

"Oh, pardon me, I assumed this was the way to the bathroom" the man spoke in a polite voice.

"Hmph" the Galvan huffed, "The bathrooms are on the right wing, this wing leads to the vault holding the most powerful experiments made by First Thinker Azmuth," the Galvan stated.

"Good to know" the man said and stepped beside the Galvan, soon vanishing before the Galvan's eyes, then he reappeared at the entrance to the vault.

"Azmuth, you can build the greatest and most secure vault ever, yet you can't hide from me." he muttered, waving his hand, the vault door soon opened up with relative ease as he saw something hovering over a pedestal. he walked up to it, waved his hand as the defenses were lowered and the object, a floating box object gently landed in his hands.

"Sorry I have to steal this from you Azmuth, but the universe needs this more" the man apologized while staring at the camera before vanishing, the vault returning to its original state as soon as the man vanished from the system.

* * *

><p><strong>So there is the first official chapter of this story, sorry if its lacking in places, I as rushing. anyway, now that Team Terraforce managed to win their first match, how will the rest of the game show go? and who was the man and what did he take from Azmuth? find out next time! Review plz!<strong>


	3. A Moment of Reprieve

**Well, sorry for the slight delay, was debating whether to upload a chapter a day or four a week...eh, I'll upload when I wanna upload, anyway this chapter is mostly filler, ugh I know, but certain videos I have recently watched make me wanna redo a few aspects of the story, including some characters. Anyway enjoy!**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 2: A moment of Reprieve <strong>

We got off the transport shuttle, the three of us heavily exhausted from the fight, and we soon crashed onto the ground.

"God that was intense…" I sighed.

"Yeah…" John replied.

"Tired…need…sleep…" Zach moaned.

"Hey guys, get up," Joseph said.

"Can't…too tired…" the three of us said.

Joseph sighed, "Frankie, a little help here…" he said. Frankie nodded and helped the three of us up and onto some couches.

"When did these get here?" I asked. I looked around and saw that the whole place was now like one of those old apartments in Brooklyn or something like that.

"Apparently Dreadzone made these to give us a sort of 'home away from home' thing," Frankie said.

"Thank you Captain Obvious…" I muttered under my breath.

"I heard that," Frankie responded.

"Fight! Fight!"

"Shut up John!"

"Okay easy there you guys, we got to find a way out of here," Joseph said trying to get us to calm down. I fumed a little bit, and calmed down after a bit. Part of me wondered why I hung out with these guys, but they were the few friends I had, and I did get along with them…somewhat…anyway, I began to look around the place, despite the appearance of something from some sitcom, it looked futuristic inside.

There was even a high-tech elevator that could take us to the upper floors of this place. We decided to go to the living quarters and soon found a bunch of doors that led to an individual room. I walked into one of them and saw red carpeting, a large window with a view of the station, a bed with a bureau that had a lamp and a clock on it right next to the bed, a closet, a Holovision monitor, and another door that slid back to reveal a sparkling bathroom.

"Kick-fucking-ass" I said as I marveled the place.

"Dude, you see these rooms?" Joseph asked as he popped into my room.

"Yeah…man this beats home huh?" I said.

"Mmmhm…" Joseph nodded in agreement.

"Dibs!" John yelled and crashed onto the bed.

"Hell no if anything I deserve this room! I'm the leader!" I yell and jump onto the bed to push John off.

"You the leader? Who made you leader?" Joseph asked.

"Well I seem to recall I lead you guys to victory so that makes me leader" I grinned.

"What if I wanna be the leader?" John asked. There was a moment of silence before we all broke out laughing.

"Ok, I got an idea, we all draw straws, shortest one gets to be leader" Joseph suggested getting a few straws in his hand.

"Sounds good, ok gather everyone" I replied and got up. A few minutes later we all gathered in the foyer and Joseph held out the straws. I looked at him, then everyone else and I began to take a straw, the others doing the same thing. I looked at the straw, then everyone else's.

I drew the shortest straw.

"Well, that's that" I mumble, "I'm the leader" I replied smirking then grinning.

"Heh alright, so who's second in command?" Joseph asked.

"you dude, you're my second" I stated smirking.

"I won't let you down" Joseph smiled happily.

"John, you're my enforcer, Zach, you're gonna be my spy, Frankie will be tech, sound good?" I asked.

Everyone nodded and I decided to celebrate with a toast, getting a bottle of soda, one of different flavors for each, I corked open my orange soda one and held it high.

"to Team Terraforce!" I declared.

"To Team Terraforce" we said and toasted. I grinned and gulped down my drink, then promptly went into my new room and checked it out.

First I inspected the bed, it was neat, futuristic bed that had a bunch of dials with different settings. I inspected the buttons closely, it had many features, one was written a "vibrator" and I flicked it, the bed made a rumbling noise and I felt it rumbling on my palm.

"Sweet" I said softly and turned it off. I looked next to the bedside table, complete with a lamp for reading, and a digital clock that currently told the time as 8:00 PM galactic standard time. I couldn't tell if this was the official time or something else, looks like my internal clock is gonna go haywire now.

Next I looked at the black sleek looking closet, containing no new outfits, guess I gotta go shopping. Next I looked at the holovision monitor and looked for a remote, finding it by m bedside table and turned it on. The monitor glowed to life as checked the guide for anything to watch, seeing thousands of TV shows for all manner of alien life, including…apparently some R-rated stuff.

Feeling myself heat up I flicked to something more local, clicking a few buttons I saw that they had shows from Earth and went and flicked to some cartoons and had it on. I smiled, this place was feeling like home now…all I just need is a computer and some game consoles. I looked at a table by the corner of my sliding door and smiled, going and flicking my hand as a holographic monitor display showed, as did a holographic keyboard with characters in English.

"Sweet" I grinned and sat down in the chair, checking the holo-computer. First it was limited to only being able to check the local listings of gladiators, clicking on them I saw it showed bios of each gladiator, how long they were on the show, cause of death, and points ranking, apparently this show had a ranking system that ranked us by points by teams total. We get points by doing challenges during matches and winning the challenges on planets.

Also I saw a list of rules to follow, first was if we tamper the collars they will explode, if any other team (excluding the exterminators) enters our suite the collars blow up. Well that's reassuring. I looked around my room, wanting to check for any camera, the bad guys always have cameras located somewhere. I huffed, looking around the corners, not being able to see anything, even with my near-sighted vision. No cameras, well, there is good news. I looked at the next door and went in, finding a fully stocked bathroom, complete with a futuristic shower and sink. Grinning I went and sniffed my pits, whew! I need a shower.

Looking around for cameras I soon went and showered off, then dried off and looked for some clothes to change into…oh shit I forgot those were my only pair. As if answering my prayers, I soon saw a hole open up and a little niche appear, revealing a freshly ironed set of PJs in red. "sweet" I grinned and changed into them, mmm freshly ironed.

Smiling now I walked out of the bathroom and laid down on the bed, normally I'd be busy on the computer, but now I am too tired. I yawned and looked at the window overlooking the station, trying to close any blinds or something. The window soon began to darken until it looked dark tinted, and I couldn't see anything on the other side of it.

"Well, there goes one more thing I gotta get used to" I yawned and let sleep take me.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, in another suite, a duo was busy washing up after their recent match. The one who was busy showering was thankful for it, all the fact that she was forced to fight these fights for this psycho, not to mention she had to deal with being paired with a cat girl, what was her race again? Animali? Catian? she forgot, what with the recent news of new meat in the ring.<p>

"Whoever these boys are, lets hope they're good" the girl huffed, her wolf ears and tail twitched as she shut the water off and dried off with a towel. She felt relaxed now, a hot shower always felt good, especially with what they fight, they end up getting covered in gunk that took days to get out of her fur.

"alright, shower is yours!" she called once she stepped out of their collective shower. She looked around their suite for any sign of her teammate, finding her was simple, she was right next to the edge of the suite staring up at the Holovision that played the most recent match.

"So that's Team Terraforce huh?" the wolf asked, standing next to the cat girl, still clad in her towel, knowing the cameras were going to be snapping pictures, eh she didn't mind as much as she did before, maybe her cat companion's influence rubbed off on her.

"yep" her companion purred as it showed brief descriptions and still-shots of each of the team's members. "that Mark kid is cute, just got to shave off that beard" the cat mused.

"Really? I think he looks older with it on" Luna smirked.

"You always did like the older ones, this kid looks to be, what was it, a puppy?" the cat said with a soft purr in her voice.

"Oh? don't you like puppies?" the wolf interjected.

"Yeah, who doesn't?" the cat grinned.

"Well, how about we keep an eye on them? See where this goes?"

"Sounds good to me, oh and you better save me some hot water!" the cat poked her friend and went to go shower.

The wolf huffed and went to go change, yet she took one last look at the still image of the leader of the terraforce team, "hmm...this is going to be an interesting season" she licked her lips as she went up, any camera spying on her would've noticed both girls had a rock in their hips.

The Twin Fists were on the move.

* * *

><p><strong>Well, there goes that idea I had out the window, had originally not wanted to add the catgirl, but I just had to now since the gears were grinding. anyway, the first match was a success, how will the rest fair? And who were those two women? Will they be of any significance to the story? Possibly! Anyway R&amp;R please.<strong>


	4. Awakening

**Sorry for missing the week, I was busy and...ok I was just lazy and didn't bother updating when I tried to force myself too, sorry. Anyway this is the first chapter of Act 1, each act will probably have an intermission chapters for character development so uh bear with me. also I am taking a few liberties with the planets that have canon, like this one, since there is barely any info about it other than its inhabitants. Anyway enjoy!**

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><p><strong>Chapter 3: Act 1- Anur Ormerow (Awakening)<strong>

_"__I still was scared after we got out of that swamp, the moans of the zombies coming towards us, the rain and mud obscuring our visors, it was the perfect recipe for one nightmare I wouldn't recover from…still, I was glad we made it out alive. but as of now...I really am hating zombies"_

_-_Audio Log 1: Anur Ormerow

* * *

><p>Anur Ormerow, a former metropolitan planet that overtime declined into a dead planet located in the Anur system, infested with ruins containing various otherworldly undead creatures, plants not normally scene in the more populated places in the galaxy had taken over the ruins of the once shiny cities it housed several humanoid, alien and robotic species, now converted into the undead due to some pathogen, and an eerie mist that gave the expression of a horror flick. It didn't help this planet housed the zombie race of the Anur system, a fact the rest of the residents to the system don't like to talk about and scarcely mention due to the ravenous hunger the residents have to brains.<p>

No one knew why the planet wasn't vaporized from orbit when the zombie outbreak caused the race to emerge, or what they were before, but the Anur residents tend to blatantly ignore the planet and forget it ever existed. A perfect way to begin the newest season of Dreadzone Z. High above the planet was the Dreadzone Z blimp, which was the same as its predecessor only with a large 'Z' behind the logo.

Inside the commentators' area was Josh and Joanne who were getting ready for the show.

"You know that Mark kid was something in the Qualifier round," Joanne said out of the blue while applying make-up.

"Yeah, who knew he could beat a robot like that" Josh said as he finished combing his hair.

"Alright, we're going to start in 3…2…1..." the director robot said.

The Dreadzone Z theme played as the screen showed the news anchors.

"Hello-o everybody and welcome to this new season on Dreadzone Z, today we're on the beautiful decayed planet of Anur Ormerow where the newly recruited Team Terraforce and several other gladiators are going to traverse through the swamp infested marshlands to a facility located deep inside the marshes, there they'll traverse the dark corridors of the facility to reach a helipad to escape, the catch? Well the planet is filled with zombies so if they can make it, good for them, if not…well…get ready for a zombie fest folks!" Josh said excitedly as the screen showed the ruins of the facility, the creatures coming out of the muck and grime that festered in this world as he explained. The last shot was of a cartoon caricature showing a combatant on a dinner table while zombies with forks and knives in their hands were about to feast.

"And look, here they come now!" Joanne said as the Transport Ship emitted a beam and Team Terraforce landed in the swampy waters.

"EEWWW! What the *bleep* is this *bleep*?" Mark yelled as he shook himself off.

"Aww dude…that's just nasty!" Zach groaned and attempted to get the green stuff off his armor.

"Sweet, let's do that again!" John said excitingly.

Needless to say the commentators were taken aback...or trying hard not to shy any indication of laughter.

"Huh, this is new…" Josh mumbled.

"Yes, who knew Mark had a foul tongue," Joanne replied.

* * *

><p>"Come on guys; let's get out of here before…okay who's touching my leg?" I yelled when I felt something rub past my leg.<p>

"Not me dude," Zach said.

"Or me…" John replied. We looked at each other and made a dash for shore, me freaking out more than the others.

"I've got a bad feeling about this…" I said, imitating Star Wars with this moment. As if on cue, we saw a bunch of hands shot up from the ground and realized: Zombies…it was zombies…and some were robot zombies, flesh zombies, alien zombies…you get the drill.

I blinked at the zombies as they all stared at us, maybe if we imitate them we can be safe. I looked around and quickly attempted to do a zombie walk.

"Brains...brains..." I groaned like a zombie in an attempt to blend in.

"Racist!" Josh called out.

"Hey if you're trying to survive, do whatever you can, but they are smarter than the average zombie" Joanne said contently.

"Uh...dude it's not working!" Zach called when the zombies still advanced to him and josh while they attempted to do the same thing.

"RUN!" I yelled and we ran as fast as we could to get away from the zombies.

"Wow…" Josh and Joanne said at the same time in sarcasm.

"I'm too hot to be a zombie!" Zach yelled.

"Don't stop. Just. Run!" I yelled as we ran forward. We suddenly saw more zombies appear out of nowhere and we pulled out our weapons and opened fire. We shot our guns in an attempt to kill the zombies, but more kept coming, some even had their body parts crawling without their owners.

_"__Mark, watch out, there's one behind you!" _Frankie said though the comm. I pointed the Magma Cannon behind me and shot, killing some zombies.

"Nice one, let's roll!" Zach said as we ran ahead. While we were running, we noticed…or rather, heard the sounds of people screaming, probably the other gladiators who were swarmed by the zombies.

"Stick close together boys, eyes peeled, watch for any sudden movements…" I said as we were huddled close together, watching each other's backs as we traversed through the swamp.

"Like Left 4 Dead…" John mused.

"Oh yeah…" Zach replied softly.

Video games usually portray zombies as mindless eating machines, actually I can kind of agree with them here, we nailed it perfectly.

"Frankie, can you get a read on the facility?" I asked.

_"__Yeah, it's due a few kilometers north, I'm also tracking the other teams, seems most are dead and you and about a few others are alive…which means that if the concept of zombification is true, you have an army of the undead between you and the facility,"_ Frankie replied.

Fuck my life...

"Gotcha, keep in touch," I said. We soon were knee-high in muck and swamp mud…among other things…

"God I'm going to be sick…" I whispered and nearly gagged in my mouth from the sight of some sort of slug creature swim pass by us.

"Yeah, let's get to the facility and get the *bleep* out of here," Zach said, the broadcast omitting the cursing. John nodded with agreement and we soon saw lights in the sky, the facility was close by. I motioned to the gang and we made our way to the lights, strange thing was, there weren't that many zombies here than before.

We soon reached a metallic looking base with the light on…and some zombies blocking the way in.

"Damn…got any options?" I asked the guys.

"We go in and blow stuff up?" John asked.

"And risk getting turned? No way," Zach replied. There were too many to fight off by ourselves…hmm…I wonder…I began to search through the features I my helmet…hmm…Temperature control, Map, Thermal Vision (use this later), X-Ray vision (kick ass), MP3 player, Scan mode…wait MP3 player? I looked at the feature and soon saw a list of songs appear…hmm…

"Guys, check to see if there's an MP3 feature in your helmets," I order to them. They looked at me confused (at least I think they were) but complied and found the feature.

"Cool, we can listen to songs while we fight!" Zach exclaimed excitedly.

"Or to use as a distraction, Frankie, can you hijack the zombie robot's memory cores to follow this song?" I asked and pressed the button of a certain song.

_"__Hmm…I can try…why?"_ he asked.

"Trust me, get ready, soon as that song plays, rush into that building," I told them. They nodded and waited…soon the sound of a spooky trumpet began to play around us and the zombie robots froze, suddenly they began to jerk and start to dance, with a robot suddenly singing.

_Hey there don't be shy_

_Step right up I'm a reasonable guy_

_Don't be frighten by the look in my eye _

_I'm just an average evil meteor from out of the sky_

"_BRAINS!_ By Voltaire, a classic," I said with a grin. While the robots were dancing, we snuck in without anyone noticing…although we did sort of participate in the big dance number when it went like this:

_Brains, Brains I won't lie!_

_I'll eat their brains 'till they zombify_

_Sure they might think it's deranged, _

_But they won't give it a thought until I eaten their brain_

_Brains, Brains it's okay!_

_It's not a matter if it isn't gray_

_Sure they might think it's derange _

_but they won't give it a thought until I've eaten their brain_

"What the hell?" Joanne asked with a cocked eyebrow, "What are they doing?" she asked confused by what was going on.

"I'd say someone managed to hack their memory cores and is making them dance…nice song though," Josh said and bobbed his head a little to the song.

_"__Alright, you've made it in!" _Frankie declared once we got inside and the door slammed shut.

"Thanks, knew it would work," I said grinning.

"Come on, let's go," Zach said as we continued onward.

_"__Alright, you're in the facility, now you'll need to go through the corridors to get to the helipad on the other side of the facility," _Frankie ordered while he drew up a schematic of the ruined place onto our visors.

_"__Also be careful, I think there might be something else inside there," _Joseph spoke up.

"Yeah, considering this place is a swamp like in _Halo: Combat Evolved_ I don't even want to think about what's in here…" John said. I nodded, scared a little bit, but nevertheless followed the team. We traveled through the corridors, watching out for anything that might kill us, when we heard a loud bang from the air vents.

"What was that?" I asked in a scared tone, who wouldn't be scared.

_"__Heads up, there's something in the vents…" _Joseph said. We looked around, my Magma cannon ready to fire.

"Hey Joanne, did you forget to mention about what was in the facility?" Josh asked her.

"Oh right…my bad, oh well, there loss," Joanne said with a shrug.

While we were traversing through the facility, we kept hearing the bangs from the air vents and I kept feeling like there was something following us. We soon saw another gladiator and we all aimed our weapons at him as he did with us.

"Back off, we don't want to hurt you," I said to him.

"Yeah right, I've heard that before," he said and aimed his gun. Just as he was going to fire, the thing we kept hearing in the air vents suddenly smashed a grating off and jumped down. In front of us was a zombie-like creature, yet it didn't look at all like one. It had flesh instead of regular skin, bladed arms instead of regular arms and toothpick-like legs. It looked at us with empty eyes and turned to the gladiator, who was freaking out and tried to shoot it.

The creature just jumped onto the ceiling and crawled before jumping onto the gladiator and ripping, and I do mean ripping, apart the gladiator with his arms. I nearly gagged as green blood was everywhere and the zombie was eating the corpse. The zombie stopped eating, turned to us, let out a screech that hurt our ears, and leapt up into the air vents.

I was both stunned, and sickened by this, so right after the creature left, I pushed the button to open my helmet and puked all over the floor. I couldn't help it, if you saw someone get torn by some weird sword zombie and there was blood everywhere, you'd puke too. I had my hand covering my mouth to try to prevent me from puking again, but I puked anyway.

"Eww…that's just nasty…" Joanne said as she began to turn a little green around the edges. "But still awesome!" she grinned, the green gone in an instant.

"Yeah…but just what in the heck was that thing?" Josh wondered.

_"__Mark, you alright?"_ Joseph asked me in a concerned tone.

"Y-yeah…just…" I gagged and held back some bile, gulping it down and felt sick from doing it. "Need…a…little…rest…" I panted and started to get up.

"Dude, I never seen you like this, you sure you're okay?" John asked.

"I'm fine!" I yelled and cooled off, "Just…need a moment…" I replied hastily. I soon regained my composure, wiping my mouth clean of my puke, and put my helmet back on.

"Come on," I said and motioned the others to follow. We continued down again, this time wary of the vents in case that…_thing_ came back. Although I didn't show it, I was paranoid right now after seeing that thing. We soon reached a main hall of some sorts and saw it was empty. There were some vents on the walls and some of the ceiling was opened, letting rain in through the holes.

"Man…whoever made this place didn't bother to clean up…" I muttered.

We soon heard the same thud sounds and saw more of those blade zombies, then we suddenly saw zombies falling from the holes in the ceiling and looked up to see the zombies from before (including one who wore an old maroon suit with a moth-eaten hat) fall down and started limping towards us.

"Oh shit…" I whimpered. The zombies saw us and immediately ran forward. The three of us shot our guns at the horde as we were being pushed back against the wall.

"Well guys…this is it…" I said as the zombies were getting closer. I suddenly felt something crawl up my leg and looked to see some sort of tendril thing snaking its way up my leg. Before I could say anything I was on the floor and was being dragged towards something. I yelled, trying to get free but it wouldn't help.

"Mark!" Zach and John yelled as they tried to grab my hand to save me. They grabbed too late and I was suddenly dragged into the darkness. I couldn't tell what was happening, but I was definitely screaming myself hoarse trying to tug my way out of whatever was dragging me. Soon as I turned around to shoot what was dragging me, I wish I hadn't, what was dragging me was a large tree-zombie thing with the branches acting like tendrils that lashed around menacingly.

Suddenly I was lifted by my leg into the air and slammed around; I felt pain everywhere and gagged out spit as I was slammed onto the ground once more. I was doubled over in pain and soon saw zombies standing before me.

"Oh sweet god no!" I yelled. I felt the zombies trying to tear my armor off and felt their ragged nails tearing at my skin. I closed my eyes, expecting the end, oh god, please, anyone, help me! I felt the zombie hands tear off chunks of my armor, leaving only the human flesh I had left.

Please?

Anyone?

Please someone help me!

I shut my eyes tighter as I felt their nails scrape on my skin, expecting my end and turning into a zombie, but I soon saw a flash of light and the zombies were gone. I saw a ball of light briefly appear before I was engulfed in light and then blacked out.

* * *

><p>Zach and John were chasing after Mark and saw a bunch of zombies crowding around Mark's body when they got there. Just as they were about to get their weapons out, a burst of light blinded them and sent the zombies flying. They soon saw Mark's body was gone.<p>

"Where'd he go?" John asked.

"Yeah…"Zach replied.

"What the hell? Where's Mark? Find him!" Joanne yelled with rage.

"Easy Joanne, we're trying, but it's like he just vanished," Josh said.

"Either you find him or your ass is going to be made into my new purse," Joanne said threateningly.

"You heard the lady, find the human!" Josh yelled to the camera crew as they frantically looked for Mark.

* * *

><p>The flash of light faded and the boy, now unconscious, was rested on the shoulder of a hooded man in brown. The man gently laid him against the ruined wall of the complex, and then looked at him carefully.<p>

_'__He is so young…too young to be involved in this game show…'_ the man thought bitterly as he laid a hand over him, the armor repairing itself until it looked brand new, and any scratches were healed. He dug into the folds of his robes, pulling out two large blades. The metal on the daggers was black as night with a blue trim on the scabbard, the hilt black as well with a dark blue scarf around it to give it a good grip. The blades would've looked like steel, but in actuality there was a button on the scabbard, once pressed the metal would super heat to a plasma like weapon capable of carving through most metal, but also the daggers could be used as guns due to the chambers on both being able to house and fire rounds of lasers out to damage foes.

"Plasma is over-rated…" the man chuckled as he laid the gifts next to the boy, then pulled out a small box, and put it in his hand as well.

"Now, don't be using that device boy, give it to your friend Joseph" he said softly and stood up once more, looking around to see if there was any danger. He sighed, relieved no zombie was nearby, and then took one last look at him. A smile, unnoticed due to the hood, crept on the figure's face as he turned to leave, "We'll meet again Mark…just you wait" he whispered softly before vanishing in a flash.

* * *

><p>I gasped as reality hit me, I was in some sort of hallway, I looked at my armor and saw it was fixed and looked brand new. I looked at my side and saw a pair of gun-daggers lay out on the ground, that's weird, did someone drop these? I also looked at my hand, seeing what looked like a small box, strangely enough it looked like something our school had given to hold class rings in.<p>

I pocketed the box and picked up the gun-daggers, twirling them in my fingers to get a feel for them, admiring their color and design. I suddenly heard static on my radio and soon I heard someone.

_"__Mark! Thank god you're alright, you okay?"_ Joseph's worried voice asked me.

"I'm fine, I just ran into some trouble is all," I said casually to not scare my friend anymore than he was already.

_"__Dude you okay? You sound…different somehow…"_ Joseph pointed out.

"I'm alright, just took a little nap…" I replied and yawn to set my point. I put my glasses back on and noticed my vision was blurry, I took the off and noticed my vision was perfect, better than it was before. _'Whoa…guess I gotta thank whoever saved me for this…'_ I thought as I put my glasses away for now, no use of these anymore, right?

I walked down the hallway and soon saw some zombies crowding around someone, with body parts flying all over the place. I looked at my gun-daggers and noticed a trigger on the hilt. I grinned and pointed the daggers at the zombies before firing at them. Some of the zombies began to come towards me, but after some hack-and-slash, along with some shooting, they were dead. I sighed with exhaustion, wiping off the grime and blood from the zombies (when I realized I forgot to put my helmet back on, stupid me) and turned around, "I think you should go, lest those zombies come back with friends," I said.

I heard an 'uhuh', probably from a female gladiator, and walked off down the corridors….

alone…

in a swamp…

full of zombies…

Help!

As if by magic, I rounded a corner and clonked heads with someone. Defensively I made a break for my newly acquired weapons and threatened to aim it forward, though seeing John and Zach again gave me relief as I hastily put them away.

"Dude! There you are!" John said and hit my head like I did something bad, "Where were you?!" he yelled.

I explained about me being dragged by a tree zombie and then the flash, then waking up with the ring and weapons. "Wow…you got a real guardian angel…" John said.

"Neither did I dude" I muttered.

"Awesome weapons dude, where can I get a pair like those?" Zach asked as he eyed my gun-daggers.

"Don't touch! They're mine!" I hissed.

Zach backed off, "Alright, alright chill," he said.

_"__Alright you three settle down, now let's finish this campaign planet already and get you boys back here, you seem like you've had enough excitement for one day," _Frankie replied.

"Yeah…come on guys, let's get to the helipad," I said. We soon went through the facility again, only this time we had each other's backs, plus the zombies were all busy it seemed with the other competitors, the yells of pain in the distance actually dragged many away from our end and we snuck by. I used the cover of a desk to hide from a zombie that was in the room. It sputtered and growled as I made a motion to Zach to take it out.

Nodding, Zach snuck up, grabbed it by the neck and dragged it to the cover, strangling it until it stopped moving, before grabbing a rock and promptly smashing it until the head was crushed. Ok ew, I see its rotting brains leak out and heaved over the desk, nearly losing my footing until John helped me up.

"Don't puke yet, we're almost done" he said as he led me to a large open area, apparently a garage. The walls on horizontal sides of each others were broken down, so was the roof, and nearly twenty zombies were between us and the helipad.

"Man, this isn't going to be pretty…" John said when he saw the zombies.

"Just shut up and start blasting," I said and cocked the Magma cannon. We charged into the horde and shot, sliced, bashed, and clawed our way to the transport ship, getting on just before the zombies could get in.

"Phew…okay…let's NEVER go back there again…" I sighed and sat down. The others all nodded and soon we were conked out on the ground.

"Well folks that concludes the first episode of the new season of Dreadzone Z! Seems like Team Terraforce pulled a fast one back there, eh Joanne?" Josh asked her.

"Personally I was hoping for one of them to turn, but where did that Mark boy get those weapons I wonder, they weren't in the standard issue for all Gladiators were they?" Joanne asked Josh.

"You know I believe some gladiators can have their own personal weapons, from what I know," Josh said with a shrug.

"Well, until next time I'm Joanne Nighthawk,"

"And I'm Josh the Smasher!"

"And we'll see you next time!"

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, on Dreadzone Z's studios, a robot was busy doing the wrap-up of the campaign.<p>

"And in other news, Team Terraforce, a group of humans from the Planet Earth, have managed to survive the zombie swamp planet of Anur Ormerow, seems like these humans aren't just meat bags after all," the robot chuckled, as did the producers.

"But besides that, Rainier, the Vesuvian mercenary, has recently beaten a gladiator named "White Knight" by bashing him with the stadium floor as a hammer, then wrapping him in the flooring and promptly engulfing it in fire and melting him alive, now that had to hurt. And it's sad to report that the third Exterminator was destroyed on a campaign planet for this season, preparations are being made for a new Exterminator to take his spot, with many believing that Mr. X, an Osmosian-X that is frequently seen with the Exterminators, will take his place. And speaking of Exterminators, Fenrir just passed his record of single handedly slaying a horde of 300 DDZ-Strikers…with only his teeth…gonna be hard for him to eat if he does that, but it's good for publicity, that's all to report now, so farewell, and goodnight," The robot said.

Back in Alistair's office, he was busy looking over the video of Team Terraforce and their victory in Anur Ormerow.

"Hmm…I wonder…" he muttered as the door opened.

"Sir…" a robot said nervously with papers in his hand.

"Yes?" Alistair asked.

"We went through the personal belongings of Team Terraforce like you asked, we found these in a folder belong to that Frankie kid," the robot said and handed him the papers. Alistair looked at them and saw they were crudely drawn pictures of robots with various abilities and other gadgets they had. One was some sort of collector with wires and tubes, another had scythe-like blade for propellers with small guns below it and one was a type of foot soldier. He looked at another one and smiled as he looked at the drawing for a larger robot that would be used as a factory and weapon. And one more looked like some sort of Iron Maiden with a skull head and drills on the coffin-like chest.

"Get me some parts and start drawing schematics of these and start building them once they're done!" Alistair said as he gave the robot the schematics.

"Right away sir!" the robot hastily said and dashed off. Alistair now returned to the desk and looked at the video from one of his private camera robots, which was now recording Team Terraforce at their suite, who were busy celebrating their first victory.

"I gotta thank these humans, because they just gave me the plans for my new army," Alistair chuckled darkly.

* * *

><p>I sighed once we returned to our suite, looking at my skeleton in the infirmary, once we got back to the station we were immediately put through decontamination, guess even Blackwell had to be wary of that zombie pathogen running loose. Once there we checked into the infirmary, a large while stereotypical hospital that, instead of housing hot busty nurses like in anime, had instead automated machines that did the work, well there goes my fantasies of busty nurse girls.<p>

I sighed once the automated scan had run its course, seeing I had no injuries and I was the picture of health...if you don't count my weak physique or asthma, yet strangely I asked to run retinal checks on me.

"Your retinal scans return positive, your eyesight is at optimal health" it spoke.

How? I wore glasses all my life, yet somehow I can read and see perfectly now. Still, don't want to make everyone worry, instead I'll lie to them and say I broke my glasses and use my helmet to compensate for my nearsightedness. But I got another reason to worry, the box I got, strangely it won't work with me, I tried opening it, but it wouldn't work, said it was 'DNA match rejected'.

I walked out of the infirmary and went to find Joseph, he was in our kitchen of our little hotel base, looking around as he and Frankie ate.

"Oh hey dude, you ok?" he asked while eating a chicken leg.

"Well, my glasses broke on the planet, so I gotta get new ones" I lied, please work, please work! Do not smirk Mark, do not smirk, they will know you lie!

"Ah that sucks dude, we'll get you new ones" Joseph reassured, wow that actually worked, sweet!

"oh right, here" I said handing him the box, "I found this on the planet, it won't work for me, yet I...I dunno I think...its for you" I said slowly trying to think of the words for it as I gave the box to him.

* * *

><p>"Oh? a ring-sized box?" I smirked at my friend, "you're not going to propose to me are you? Wow didn't know you were gay" I said mischievously.<p>

"I am not gay!" Mark blushed furiously, "I just found that thing in my hands when I woke up I swear!" he shouted.

I laughed, it was fun to poke fun at him. "I'm kidding relax" I laughed as I saw Zach and Josh come in as I opened the box.

There was a ring, a small one, white as pure snow and with green and black edgings around it, huh, it looks faintly like that thing that Ben Tennyson had that changed him to those aliens...hold the phone.

"Dude..." I heard Josh muttered as I fingered the ring and slipped it on curiously.

**"DNA MATCH CONFIRMED, COMMENCING OMNITRIX DNA SEQUENCE"** a computer voice spoke from the ring. A green light emanated from the ring, blinding everyone, but my senses dulled as I felt a tingly sensation course through my body, as if the ring was scanning my body down to the microscopic level, every pore was analyzed, it felt like hours passed when really a few seconds went by as the light stopped.

**"DNA CONFIRMED, SUBJECT: JOSEPH, SPECIES: HUMAN MALE, OMNITRIX NOW BONDED TO SUBJECT AND HAS ACCESS TO TEN ALIENS OF CHOICE BASED ON SELECTION"** the voice spoke.

**"COMMENCING DNA CATALOG VIEWING FOR USER INPUT" **the ring glowed and soon showed the many shapes of aliens, many unknown, but some were iconic, as we all saw Ben Tennyson use them on TV.

I looked at my friends, who looked at the ring then me, and I shrugged, trying to figure this all out was going to be a while, but hey, I get to choose my aliens.

"Ok, uh I'll choose my aliens now" I said sheepishly and stared at the catalog of the aliens. Each alien had a picture, and a description of the name of each alien and what they are. I grinned and soon began picking out my favorite aliens I saw on TV because of Ben Tennyson, soon I got ten of my favorite aliens and the catalog disappeared.

**"ALIEN SELECTION COMPLETE, TO SELECT THE ALIEN OF CHOICE, THIS UNIT COMES WITH VOICE RECOGNITION SOFTWARE, SPEAK THE NICKNAME OR NAMES OF THE SPECIES YOU WISH TO SELECT AND IT WILL BE USED"** the Omnitrix explained.

I grinned from ear to ear at this and smiled, then looked at the Omnitrix and thought of Diamondhead, the nickname of the alien Ben used, and promptly spoke, "Diamondhead" I said to the Omnitrix. A green flash appeared and soon I felt my body undergoing changes, getting bulkier and taller, not to mention heavier. When the light faded I looked at my hands, seeing they were now made of a form of crystal.

"whoa...cool!" my voice spoke, now deeper and more masculine with a hint of the alien's tone in my voice.

* * *

><p>"dude...you are the luckiest man alive!" I said and grinned happily and excitedly, jumping up and down staring at the crystal alien before us. It looked exactly like alien ben used, but it was covered in the crystals to resemble a huge mass of man with a pointed head and yellow eyes, on his body it was a style of jumpsuit that was half black, half white with the circular symbol of the Omnitrix on his chest.<p>

"I know! wait...how do I change back?" Joseph asked the symbol on his chest.

**"TO SWITCH BACK, EITHER IMAGINE YOUR HUMAN FORM OR WAIT FOR THE TIME TO RUN OUT OF TRANSFORMATION"** the voice spoke.

Joseph blinked, then concentrated as he soon covered in green light and reverted to his normal form.

"Well this is awesome!" joseph said holding up his hand with the ring on it.

"This is gonna be fun!" I grinned happily.

* * *

><p><strong>OK before you people blast me for adding another Omnitrix, hear me out. Firstly, while I know Ben is the only person to have one, and in the original series his son Ken has one as well. I figured that Azmuth would've made a back up of the completed version (the Omniverse one) due to the way ben uses it, it tends to get destroyed or something, so he created a back up one and had it stashed deep and away to make sure no one got it. How did that hooded guy know and why did he give it to Joseph? Eh, I'll explain later in the story trust me but feel free to think your own theories. also I took liberties of Anur Ormerow, given all we know is the zombies come from it.<strong>

**Anyway, as for the drawings, I will have plans, trust me. Now that the first planet has been done, how will they fare against the second? Well wait to find out xP. R&R! Oh, before I forget and someone flames me: I DO NOT OWN THE SONG "Brains" BY VOLTAIRE, IT'S STRICTLY HIS...AND POSSIBLY THE GRIM ADVENTURES CREATORS. Sorry for the caps just wanna give credit before I get flamed ^^;**


	5. Shock and Awe

**Again, sorry for lack of updating, been helping my friend with a...personal project, its a manga we're all making, and I'm writer so...bear with me. Anyway, enjoy this chapter.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 4: Act 1-Nabrillloth (Shock and Awe)<strong>

_"__Nabrillloth…what happened on that world still haunts me to this day…Not only did I see the first taste of pain…I also met someone I'd never forget in this lifetime I have, well two actually…I guess…that day is what caused everything to change…"_

-Audio Log 2: Nabrillloth, Mark I.

* * *

><p><strong>A few days before the next campaign planet...<strong>

Blackwell huffed as he looked over the operating table of his newest creation, mostly he was watching for the new robots he had asked his men to create using new schematics he made for each model. But this robot, this one had history, true it took him a while to find its processing unit amidst the rubble back in Blackwater City's dump, however he found it for a cheap price...once he got rid of the proprietor of the junkyard.

"Alright, what's the status on it?" he asked the robot mechanic.

"Well sir, we managed to build it a new model more compatible with newer weaponry, however..." the robot stopped, making the lion glare back at the tin can on legs.

"But what?" he growled.

"Well...we couldn't upgrade the processor to anything other than caffeinated drinks" the robot explained. Blackwell sighed, pinching his eyebrows together in frustration.

"Well what are our options?" he asked.

"Well we did find an espresso maker we can gut its processor and use it with its memory unit" the robot said in a hopeful tone.

"Well I do like espressos...do it, and make sure it's ready for the next planet!" Blackwell jabbed a finger at the robot and walked off. If he got this robot working, then he'd have a powerhouse of an Exterminator to work with, one who'd be more powerful than perhaps Rainer.

* * *

><p><strong>Unknown time<strong>

A panting escaped the boy's lips as he hid from the guards, hiding behind some crates in the cargo bay. He had barely escaped the prison cell in the block under the station. He wasn't alone, but he was one of several kidnapped from their homes when the Dreadzone Z robots were looking for fresh meat. He stopped his breathing as he heard footsteps pass, then breathed when they were gone. He glanced away from the boxes and around a corner, seeing a large carrier ship, maybe that would be his way out?

Before he could move he saw a group of gladiators walking into the hold, three he recognized as they were talking nonchalantly. _'It's them!'_ he thought as he looked around for guards then stealth fully snuck past the cargobots and towards the carrier's lift. Before anyone noticed, he snuck into the hold as the ship's door closed and he got into a safe haven behind some boxes as he felt the ship groan and lift up before shooting into space.

* * *

><p><strong>Present<strong>

The Planetary Transport glided over the planet of Nabrillloth, it was a manufacturing and processing world run by a corporation or something. It was a terrestrial and it had forests, lakes, mountain, and was an urban planet with dozens of cities. It looked mostly like Earth, only with more cities and futuristic compared to our Earth. We began to enter the atmosphere of the planet, now seeing the skyscraper cities that matched cities like New York and Washington D.C. back home.

"Wow…Earth got nothing on this…" I muttered, staring out the window.

"Yeah…how come Earth isn't like this?" John asked.

"Because they're only concerned with war and nothing else, it's stupid actually," I said darkly.

"Yeah, if the human race would only focus more on the economy and science, we'd be like this," Joseph said. You're probably wondering how Joseph got here, well after Anur Ormerow when we got back to the station, I gave the ring Omnitrix to Joseph, which was now on his ring finger. He soon become a new addition to the team's main force, which is me, John and Zach, and he already had 10 aliens ready to use, some he picked specifically. **(This little paragraph was incase no one read the last chapter)**

"Yeah…so what do we gotta do again?" I asked, flopping onto the couch of our small compartment on the ship.

"Don't you remember? We have to kill some robots the Director sent into the city to cause havoc, he wants this to be simple" Joseph replied.

"Ooh yeah…" I mused, remembering the instructions.

We soon saw some explosions in the city and knew where our targets were. I felt disgusted; Blackwell was dragging innocent civilians into his game, probably for more ratings if it involves civilian deaths.

"Split up and meet in the square?" I suggested.

"Done," the others said and we split up to get to the targets.

Meanwhile, back on the Dreadzone blimp, Josh and Joanne were in their seats facing the camera, but there was a third person with them. It was Mark's friend Ethan, who recently became the team's promotional manager, he had dark brown curly hair with a beard, and he was sort of chubby and he was wearing a dark blue shirt and beige pants with the Dreadlocked collar around his neck.

"Well seems like your friends aren't going to last when separated, eh Ethan?" Joanne asked him.

"Well for Mark I'd say he's dead, the others are probably going to die a gruesome death as well," Ethan said, much to their shock.

"You really want to see them die?" Josh asked with a cocked eyebrow.

"Kind of," Ethan replied with a shrug.

_"__Ethan, remind me to kill you for this once we get back to the Station…"_ Mark's voice spoke though the comm. link in the suits.

"Like you can, you just say that but you don't really mean-" He was cut off when a bullet smashed through the window near Ethan's head.

_"__Mind repeating that?"_ Mark asked coldly.

"No, it's cool," Ethan squeaked.

"Wow…remind me to never piss him off…" Josh muttered.

* * *

><p>I smirked as I twirled my Twin Cerberus gun-daggers (I named them a while ago); quickly sheathing them I walked down the busy street to where the source of the explosion was. I soon found the smoke and quickly made my way through the screaming crowds and saw it was a large robot with armor and wielding a wrench bigger than John's wrench.<p>

"So you're the only one? I expected Dreadzone to send an army," I said. As if on cue I saw more DDZ-strikers coming out of the rubble and they aimed directly at me. I smirked and made a motion with my fingers, "Bring it on…" I said.

* * *

><p>Joseph was heading to his location, using XLR8 to get there quicker and soon found it filled with DZZ-Strikers along with the same hulking robots Mark was fighting.<p>

"Hmm, time to use a new guy," Joseph said and slammed his hand on the Omnitrix. He soon changed in a yellow plated alien that looked like an armadillo with; you guessed it, rock crushers for hands.

"Armadrillo!" he bellowed.

The Announcers, as was everyone watching, were shocked by the change.

"Wait, that kid has an Omnitrix?!" Joanne yelled in exasperation.

"Where'd he get one?" Josh wondered aloud.

"Does it really matter? I mean Ben Tennyson has one" Ethan stated the obvious.

"Yeah but that's the only one we know of, Azmuth never said he was making another…" Josh stated, getting strange looks from his compatriots. "What? I only heard rumors…" Josh mumbled and looked back out on the screen.

The robots soon saw him as Armadrillo's hands went into its sockets, two nails protruded from his elbows and slammed into the ground, causing the ground to shake and break up and sending the robots plummeting into the ground and rubble. Unfortunately it also caused some windows to end up smashing and toppled over a few signs, like if an earthquake hit.

"Huh, seems like they need to upgrade these guys," Joseph said as he changed back to his human form. "Alright guys, I'm done where I am, how's your work going?" He asked through the radio as he went towards the city square.

* * *

><p>"Fine, I'm nearly done here," John replied as he bashed another robot with his wrench. He ducked under another one and grabbed its head with the open part, twisting it, causing the head to twist with thee wrench till it popped out. John used the momentum to swing the wrench, freeing the head which landed in the arms of another Striker. The striker looked, then screamed and ran away from its comrade's head...hitting a signpost and falling on its back.<p>

"What about you Mark?" John asked as he followed suit to the courtyard.

* * *

><p>"Fine! Just gotta beat this last guy, see you at the LZ in a few," I said as I blocked the wrench with my dagger and used the other to shoot the robot in the arm. While it was stunned I put both blades together and pushed a button, the blades both mended together and became one sword with a gun attachment on it and soon slashed the robot in two.<p>

"Alright, heading to the square now," I said, panting heavily, damn asthma, now you decided to kick in? Ok, I will admit to my having asthma, but it never bugged me before…well mostly it was because of the fact I wore a helmet. Just as I was going to leave I heard the sound of more fighting coming from what looked like a convenience store. Me being curious, I decided to follow it and soon found someone fighting the robots inside. Soon as some were cleared away I saw who was fighting the robots. I felt the heat rise to my face because the one fighting all the robots was a girl. **(Insert sexy saxophone music here)**

She was wearing the same type of armor we had, only hers seemed to fit her figure, she didn't have her helmet on so I was able to see her face. She had beautiful grey hair, but it looked to be dark blue, maybe a dark cool grey. She looked to be around my age, and she had light brown, hazel eyes with cat-like pupils. Then I also noticed she had two wolf ears on her head…wait…two wolf ears and a tail…what the hell? Not only that I noticed clearly she had fur on the edges of her face, where the sideburns would start to be accurate, she looked almost beast-like in appearance.

She noticed me hiding and I saw her wink at me as she kicked a robot in my direction, I managed to roll out of there before the robot hit the wall.

"Oi! Watch where…you're throwing those things, you nearly hit me!" I yelled at her from the panting. _'Crazy ass bitch…'_ I muttered. The wolf-girl giggled cutely as she kicked another robot and sent it flying into a building. Suddenly one of the giant robots grabbed her from behind and she squirmed to get free. I pulled out my gun-daggers and aimed, but before I could even fire, the wolf girl slammed her heel hard between its legs, which made it stop, let her go and hold the space there

"Never knew robots had balls" I mumbled.

I looked at the robot as it held its, well groin or something, as the wolf girl smirked, cracking her knuckles menacingly. "never, grab a lady from behind, you piece of trash" she said darkly, coldly, almost…sadistically, and began beating and tearing it apart.

I don't know if robots felt pain, or at least knew the concept of fear, but at that moment I was pretty sure the screams from the robot were of genuine pain and fear. Hell if I were in its position I'd be screaming and begging for my life too.

I took a few steps back and gulped, not wanting to get in the she-wolf's way once she tossed the head into a garbage can and saw me. The gleam in her eyes, the growling, made me nearly piss my pants as I stepped away.

"Well you've got this place covered, I'll be leaving," I said and took a few steps back before running for sheer life. I didn't look back, I was too scared of her, I didn't even both to check if she was following me or not. I panted when I got a good distance away from the scene and slid against the wall, shivering and the feeling of nausea in my throat.

Don't puke, don't puke, don't…and there goes my lunch.

I wipe my mouth and pant before feeling a hand on my back, I froze and looked, seeing instead of the wolf girl from before, it was someone else, and I couldn't help but blush from her looks. See, the girls before me was, well a catgirl to be blunt. To be accurate, she was a humanoid looking girl, just with cat ears and a tail, both grey colored, and her armor had the same coloration as her hair and tail, but tinted with black accents to meld with her grey color armor, almost like ashes.

"Hey kid…you ok?" her voice asked softly, concern in her tone. Compared to the wolf girl from earlier, she was very nice, she of course had the eyes of a predator, maybe antics as well, but so far she seemed really nice.

"I'm sorry my friend scared you, I guess her beastly side emerged and you saw it, she can go overboard when someone messes with her tail, or attacks from behind" she said, frowning bitterly.

"Hey, don't be sad, I mean I'm still new to this fact I'm on an alien gameshow with other aliens…no offense" I state defensively.

"Heh, no problem kid, and thanks for being honest"

"You're welcome…and I'm not a kid, I'm 19," I replied with pride.

"So you're my age then…that's cool," the cat girl smirked a bit from the corner of my eye when she stood up and against the wall.

"Thanks…wait you're 19 too?" I asked, turning to look at her fully now.

"Yeah…name's Christine, the wolf girl you saw was my friend Luna and you're Mark, Team Terraforce's leader, and a human to be precise," Christine said in 'as-a-matter-of-fact' tone.

"Heh, yeah…so…your friend is she a wolf or something like that?" I asked while scratching my head softly, slightly embarrassed with talking to her.

"Wolfen to be precise," she replied nonchalantly as I saw her friend walk up next to her, wanting to see what was going on.

"Sweet, I like wolves," I said innocently. Luna blinked a bit when she heard that, then grinned a bit at this and eyed me in a seductive way. Christine glanced at her and looked at me too, same way.

"I mean I also like cats too...just wish I wasn't allergic..." I added nervously.

"Oh really?" she asked with a grin and a suggestive tone to her. Before I could say anything, the comm. blared in my helmet.

_"__Oh Mark, where the hell are you?!"_ Joseph's voice asked anxiously.

Well, there goes my moment of being cool…stupid Joseph.

"Sorry, I'm busy at the moment talking with these women I just me," I replied.

_"__Whoa, a girl is actually talking to you? You didn't start quoting things did you? Or rambling about video games?"_ Joseph asked with a groan.

"No…I'll head to the RV soon, Mark out." I said and ended the talk.

"Well looks like I got to go to my team at the square, see you another time?" I asked Christine.

"Alright, here, you can have this," she handed me a small folded piece of paper before leaving. I looked at the piece of paper and opened it, grinning when I realized it was her number.

"Sweet…" I grinned and soon remembered my team, quickly rushing to the square.

"Heh, good luck, boy, you're gonna need it" Luna smirked as she and Christine walked off, having a little swing in her hips, mainly for show to the camera.

"Wow, Mark just scored big time," Ethan said with surprise.

"Wasn't that the supposed 'Demon Fist Luna' and 'Divine Fist Christine' the Twin Claws?" Joanne inquired curiously yet excited.

"Oh yeah she is, 'Demon Fist' Luna, she supposed to be extremely strong, and Christine is...well a femme fatale, too bad Mark doesn't know," Josh smirked a bit.

_"__You do realize you just said that on Holovision, right?"_ Mark asked from his helmet.

"…Oh yeah…whoops…" Josh said meekly.

_"__Tch, idiots…"_ Mark mumbled.

* * *

><p>"So that's Mark huh? he seemed scrawny to you too, right?" Luna asked as she walked beside Christine.<p>

"Maybe, but he was kinda cute" the cat purred a bit, fingers to her lips thinking of the terran boy.

"Yeah I guess in a little brother sort of thing..." Luna shrugged.

"Really? maybe if you didn't scare him you'd see he was innocent, he probably thought you were a monster" Christine stated harshly to her.

Luna stopped, she sighed, she hated being called a monster, just because she was a wolf, due to the stigma she and her kind had, the werewolf gene from her ancestors. Plus didn't help the humans thought of her kind as monsters either.

"I now ok? but you know how I am in a fight" Luna stated to Christine.

"I do, next time control yourself ok?" Christine asked politely, yet the tone hinted something else, a hint of a motherly side to her, like a child being scolded by their parent.

"Fine..." Luna sighed and huffed, then glanced at the floor and wagged her tail whimsically, "so, whatcha sense in him? anything good?" she asked.

Christine smirked, given her nature, she could sense the aura of a person, one of her...many gifts. "Yeah, he's got a strong aura, but it's asleep..." she looked up to the skies and had a distant look in her eyes. "I wonder...when it wakes up, will he be our salvation...or our ruin?" she muttered softly under her breath.

Luna's ears twitched, catching the last part, she gently put a hand on her compatriot's shoulder and gave a thumbs up, "don't worry, he'll use it to have fun probably" she grinned.

Christine smiled softly, thanking her silently for the encouragement then glanced as she saw yet another group of baddies before them.

"Let's take out the trash, shall we?" she asked, readying her weapons with a grin as the duo charged to the fray.

* * *

><p>I smirked as I overheard the remark Josh gave to me, just ignoring him and went to the square where the others were waiting.<p>

"Okay spill it dude, who was she?" Joseph asked.

"Just a cat girl I met gave me her number," I grinned as I waved the number in between my fingers.

"Lucky…" John said with a hint of envy…wow, I just made someone jealous, awesome! I grinned but soon frowned as I saw a bunch of Dropships coming towards us.

"Dropships…" I said as I readied my Magma cannon.

"Man, why can't those boys just die?" Joanne moaned with discomfort as the announcers watched the fighting.

"I know, they're only 19 and they're acting like an elite commando unit," Josh said. There was a telephone ringing and Josh picked it up.

"Hello? Yes…what?!" Josh exclaimed over the phone. While the other two commentators looked, Josh quickly turned to the camera.

"Dreadzone Z fans this just in, Shellshock has returned to the game!" Josh exclaimed.

"Shellshock?! Oh my god he was my favorite contestant! Don't just stand there, put him on!" Joanne squealed and shook Josh, urging him to get Shellshock on the Holovision. The Holovision soon changed to show a robot with an army helmet on his head, cigar in his mouth, and wearing green and grey plated armor, it was Shellshock, only he looked to be more bulky and now had a large gun in his hands.

"Welcome back to the game Shellshock, how does it feel coming back to a new Dreadzone?" Josh asked.

"Oh it's very good, I've been smashing up contestants ever since I came back online," Shellshock said in an Arnold Schwarzenegger voice.

"Love the new design too, what's your secret? how did you even get back anyway?" Joanne inquired eagerly.

"Simple, Blackwell rebuilt me, now I got even more guns" he reveals his gun having ports, revealing several smaller guns and pistols in them, "and I even got more powah, though I now got it from an espresso maker" he grumbled.

"Cool, so what are you going to do for your comeback debut?" Joanne asked.

"I'mma going to blow those humans to bits with my new upgrades, packed with enough napalm to melt anything in sight, and with a little…bonus package too" Shellshock said as he pulled up the barrel of the gun. It was a large green gun that had a huge barrel and was now glowing, charging up to fire.

"Now this I gotta see," Joanne grinned wickedly as she was on the edge of her seat.

"I just hope your friends can survive this Ethan," Josh said.

"Yeah…" Ethan mumbled.

* * *

><p>Back on the ground, we were too busy trying to stop the waves of Dreadzone Z robots from heading towards the capital building in the square.<p>

_"__Alright, you're doing great out there, keep it up,"_ Frankie encouraged.

"Like we have a choice," I mumbled and blasted a robot's head off. This fighting continued for a few minutes before the drop ships stopped coming.

"Phew, that's the last of them," I sighed. We soon heard clapping and saw some of the citizens, who were human-like in appearance, all around us. We soon saw some people in rather expensive attire and we assumed they were the leaders of this planet…or the corporation.

"Well well, seems like there are some Dreadzone Challengers who actually don't want to cause destruction, you have our thanks," the first person, a man wearing a grey suit with stars embedded on it said.

"You're welcome…so you're part of a corporation right, what do you guys do?" I asked.

"We help ship machine parts to different parts of the universe, when we heard of Earth we were deciding to send parts to help its technology, but we couldn't get a transmission through," the man said.

"Huh, that explains so much, with our primitive technology and all…" I said with a hint of a grin under my helmet.

"Perhaps we can make a deal, you saved our planet, how about we help yours by sending some technology to assist in your planet's technology department?" the man asked.

"Hmm…I may have to consort with the world leaders but since they'll probably be discussing this for a while, I'm going with 'yes' on this," I said and shook his hand.

"Excellent, you're Plumbers right?" he asked.

"Do we look like Plumbers?" Joseph asked, then looked at his Omnitrix. "Ok…well I guess I would be considered one" he replied.

"I see, well, I'll go and contact the Plumbers and get some consideration for the proposal, if it goes through we'll send the parts to earth and get more formal consideration with the leaders" the CEO spoke.

"Good luck with that" I mutter and turn to walk away with the others to the Planetary Transport.

I didn't even realize what was about to happen.

* * *

><p>"Well it looks like the Earthlings just scored a deal with Nabrillloth…wonder what'll happen to earth now," Josh said.<p>

"Shellshock, please tell me you're ready yet?" Joanne asked impatiently.

"Am now, Hope you all enjoy 'he show" Shellshock grinned and pulled the trigger, a huge beam of energy shot from the gun and into the sight of the city, to the unsuspecting people…the team as well

Frankie was watching this and gasped with shock, "Mark, incoming barrage! Get out of there! …Mark?! Can you hear me?" he yelled.

* * *

><p>My team and I were now walking down a street when we saw someone ahead…oh shit was that…<p>

"THE GAME!"

Yep…it was Conner…

"Son of a bitch man," I groaned. That stupid game...that mother-fraking stupid game!

"Dude, you just made the whole Universe lose the game…and when did you get here?" Joseph asked once he stopped laughing.

"I broke out of the jail they had in that station and snuck onboard here," Conner replied.

"How'd you even get captured anyway?" I asked incredulously.

"I got captured alongside Joseph, I was hanging at his place when they showed up"

"right, forgot to mention that…" Joseph scratched the back of his head embarrassed.

Wait...so if they had taken Conner from Joseph's place, could that mean that my brother and mom were taken too?

"Well, regardless, glad you're here" I said high-fiving him, maybe we had a chance with our increased numbers, we might actually win this game.

We suddenly got a call from our radios from Frankie, _"Mark, get out of there, you got a laser blast are locked on to you!"_ he yelled.

We looked at one another in horror and looked up, the beam zooming closer to us as everything began getting brighter.

"Oh shit, RUN!" I yelled ad we began running.

"Hey, what are you running from?" Conner asked. He turned around and saw the blast heading towards him.

"HOLY Shi-" was what he barely got out before the shot hit, engulfing everything in white. Shellshock grinned from his visor as the explosion domed and expanded, taking most of the city in the resulting explosion and incinerating anything caught in the blast.

"Targets eliminated…" he said coolly and began once more smoking on the cigar.

* * *

><p>On the Dreadzone Z blimp, the commentators were watching with awe at the destruction, with Joanne now ecstatic. Once the smoke and light cleared there was now a huge crater where the explosion hit, the once tall skyscrapers now reduced to crumbling ruins, glass melted into the ground, becoming sand, fires everywhere and buildings crumbled from the stress of the weight of the now weakened support beams.<p>

It was like a warzone down there, and all it took to break the calm from earlier was one shot.

"Yes! The Terraforce Team is dead!" she said happily. Her two male counterparts however, looked horrified by the destruction Shellshock had done.

"Mark…" Ethan mumbled in shock once the gravity of his friend's death hit.

"Wait a minute, I think I see something moving," John said as they saw something move in the wreckage of the city center.

* * *

><p>I gasped, coughing and covered in…ah damn I couldn't tell, but everything in my body hurt like hell. I saw my visor was crack and some of it was opened, my helmet retracted and I saw droplets of blood on the ground, I held my hand over my head and saw blood on it.<p>

"Son of a bitch…" I cursed as I tried to get up. My legs ached and wobbled like jello, but what I saw just paralyzed me. There was rubble and napalm everywhere, not to mention dead citizens who got caught in the blast. I nearly threw up seeing the corpse of a mother holding the hand of her child trying to escape the explosion.

"Oh my god..." I breathed out in disgust, how can one person cause this much damage? Dread filled me when I realized the others were caught in the blast as well.

"God damn it move," I growled as I tried to get up. I panted, and amidst the screaming and crying people, I knew my friends were somewhere there. But...the screaming, the crying, the once peaceful city nearly gone, and Call of Duty makes this a 'set-piece' moment? COD has nothing on this horror, they couldn't match the sheer brutality of the situation.

"John?! Joseph?! Conner?! Ah, god fucking damn it no, don't you be dead on me now!" I yelled and collapsed onto the ground, now in pain from the shrapnel on my body, specifically my leg. I grunted, grabbing the piece and ripped it out, yelling as blood spurted down my calve. I heard someone coming and was helped up by no other than Luna and Christine.

"Never thought I'd find you here," I said to her.

"We saw the explosions and I came to see what they were about, judging by your state I'm saying someone used a Harbinger to do this…" Luna replied as she helped me up.

"I bet they did…gah!" I yelled and held my leg, groaning from the pain. "Son of a bitch!" I cried and nearly stumbled, but Luna grabbed my shoulder to help me support myself.

"Don't worry, I got you" she reassured me softly.

"Take it easy ok? I'm surprised you're stable enough to move" Christine added, holding my other shoulder for support.

I panted, breaking out in a sweat, then heard a groan and saw John, injured and hurt, god John, you're a mess. He had a few pieces of shrapnel in his armor, his visor cracked and splintered, and he collapsed on the ground. I hobbled to my friend, who was trying to get up despite the pain and laid down, head on my lap.

"Easy, you're injured," Luna said as we helped him up.

"W-where are the others?" he asked. We heard a yell and rushed towards it and found Joseph…oh my god…we found Joseph clutching the area where his bad leg was.

It was a bleeding stump all the way up to his knee, his leg got blasted off in the explosion…

"OH MY FUCKING GOD!" I yelled.

"Holy shit!"

"Oh my..."

"Dude! Are you okay?!"

"DOES IT LOOK LIKE I'M OKAY?!"

"Wait, where's Conner?" I asked.

"I think the shot vaporized him…" I grunted and stumbled. I gasped a bit, the smells of blood, death, sand, I felt so sick. I tore off my helmet then fell to my knees, exhaustion kicking in as I soon threw up all over the ground. Wait…since when was my vomit red colored?

That's not good…I feel tired…maybe a nap will make me feel better. I toppled over, the last thing I thought I heard was someone calling my name before darkness overcame me.

* * *

><p>"Well that was an interesting way to end an episode, don't worry folks they'll be alright…hopefully," Josh said to the camera, though the look of worry on his face showed what he was really thinking.<p>

"Well at least that Conner boy is dead," Joanne said.

"Man, wanted Mark dead…" Ethan mumbled.

"Let them recover first, then you can kill them," Joanne said.

"Kenny and the others must be steaming with Mark not dead yet…" Ethan said.

"Wait; there are people who want them dead? Tell me more" Joanne said.

"Only Mark mainly," Ethan stated.

"Right…until next time I'm Josh,"

"I'm Ethan,"

"And I'm Joanne,"

"And this is Dreadzone Z!"

* * *

><p>Back at the planet, Shellshock was looking at the wreckage and frowned when he saw the humans were alive.<p>

"Guess I gotta use another round," he said and loaded the gun.

He was stopped by Fenrir, who popped up behind him.

"Hey, why you gotta do this? I'm just about to blow them ta pieces!" Shellshock said.

"No…you've done enough, we leave them alive…" Fenrir replied in the same monotonous tone.

"Fine…killjoy…" shellshock mumbled.

"I'm warning you, try anything and I'll turn you into scrap metal again like that Lombax did to you..." Fenrir growled. The ex-turned-reinstated Exterminator scoffed and backed off, who did he think he was, ordering him around like he owned him.

"Alright, alright easy there man…" he backed off then paused for a moment, "wait…why do you want those humans alive?" Shellshock asked as they saw the ambulance and Dreadzone Z medics helping out the gladiators still caught under the rubble.

"That boy…" Fenrir pointed to Mark, who was being put into a Dreadzone Z ambulance.

"Him?" Shellshock asked.

"Yes…" Fenrir replied.

"Why him?"Shellshock asked.

"He's…very important…" Fenrir said.

"Alright, but he won't be important after that explosion," Shellshock laughed. He shut up after seeing Fenrir's glare. "Okay, okay, geez can't take a joke?" Shellshock said.

Fenrir just turned and walked away from him, the smoke from the explosion flying into the sky behind him.

* * *

><p>"Seems like those kids are stronger than I thought..." Blackwell muttered as he watched the news feed of the incident. "better take care of that" he muttered, pressing some keys on his keyboard s he flicked a camera on, his image appearing in a box on the news feed.<p>

"hello, and to any people watching on Dreadzone Z's channel, you all saw the city of Nabrilloth get destroyed, while many believe it was Shellshock, it was actually a newly created prototype I made to field test some new weaponry, however, the robot you saw went rogue and began causing untold destruction, and is no way in relation to Dreadzone Z, regardless of what it spoke, we urge all residents of any new planets for our campaigns to remain indoors at all times, and we will try to limit property damage to a minimum at best" he spoke politely before leaving the camera off.

"Yeah right!" he laughed. Whether the public bought it or not, at least he gave an alibi, oh how the public could be generally swayed with pretty words and false truths.

"Now that Shellshock is operational and even stronger, he'll make a great Exterminator now" he grinned and purred happily.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile on Earth, deep in a high tech area, a group of aliens, men and women in the same white armor watched on the monitors the destruction that was wrought.<p>

"My god…He wiped out an entire city with one shot…" One of the plumbers muttered.

"We're getting reports, sending ships to aid the sector now, the entire plumber HQ there got wiped out, same with the Magister" another called frantically checking the messages on the screen.

"What about those kids?" A man's voice asked, his hands gripping the railing while staring at the monitors.

"They're injured, and about to go into surgery now, Magister Max, what do we do?" a helmeted officer asked turning to the man in the Hawaiian shirt.

The human Magister stood up from the railing, "Get plumbers there and immediately get another Magister there to oversee the reconstruction," he ordered.

"What about you sir?" a Plumber asked.

"I need to pay a visit to this Team Terraforce" he replied and stepped into the elevator, but stopped seeing his brown haired grandson in the elevator.

"Grandpa Max, did you see, that Joseph kid, he's got an Omnitrix!" the brown haired teen said anxiously.

"I know, come on, we got a team to visit" Max replied as he went into the elevator with him and the doors shut.

* * *

><p><strong>Well, that just happened, I realized I was being a bit hard on COD, but in all seriousness after watching The Game Theorists on Youtube and seeing their videos on COD, I realized that two things: one, the characters can get away with making lots of war crimes in that game, and two: lasers are not under the Geneva convention...so we can have a death star if we wanted to...creepy. Anyway hope you all liked this chapter, R&amp;R please.<strong>


	6. Interlude 1

**Yep, we got us a short chapter here so sorry, but this is to help establish characters and such, also to establish plot. Anyway enjoy**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 5: Act 1- Interlude I (Recovery)<strong>

_"__The feeling of losing…well a lot of things…really sucks, I learned that a friend died, one got his leg torn off, another in a coma, and…man…this sucks…I keep wondering why we're here, I mean, they could've chosen from a bunch of other people and they choose us…what did we do wrong? But…fuck…why them…they got hurt and I just got scratches?! Damn it why them!?"_

-Audio Log 3: Dreadzone Station Infirmary, Mark I.

I couldn't tell what was happening; I heard voices unfamiliar to me, brief glimpses of faces, colors, etc. When I was fully able to get into consciousness, I was in a hospital bed with IR needles on my arm. Everything was white, and it was difficult to see anything given the bright intensity of the sterile room. Yet I could make out two figures, one big, another small, both blurry but soon they were coming into focus.

"Hey, welcome back," a voice said. I looked and saw a large man with grey hair, wearing a Hawaiian shirt with a black shirt underneath and brown khaki pants. It was Max Tennyson, of course I knew him, anyone who knew of Ben Ten heard of his cousin, his friend who was infamous in the criminal world, and his grandpa.

"You're…Max Tennyson" I groaned and gasped, forcing myself onto my back and coughed violently.

"Easy there, you took a nasty hit from that Harbinger blast, I'm just glad you aren't badly hurt like the others" Max replied, smiling a bit.

"Ooh…w-what happened?" I moaned after my coughing fit.

"Shellshock shot a Harbinger round at you guys, luckily you and Zach only had shrapnel," Ben said as he stepped into the room.

I stared at Ben, eyes wide, it was him, Ben Tennyson! He wore a white and green trimmed hoodie and brown cargo pants, and on his wrist, the same color at his hoodie, was the Omnitrix.

"Ben Ten? Heh, if I knew being injured would get you to meet me, I'd have gotten on the show earlier" I joked weakly.

Ben laughed a bit, "Well, when I saw your friend have an Omnitrix, I needed to talk with him" the hero spoke.

"You mean Joseph?" I asked sitting up again despite some initial struggle.

"Yeah, first: how did he gets his hands on it? I thought that Azmuth wouldn't let anyone have another Omnitrix" Ben asked.

"Don't look at me, I remember on Anur Ormerow I nearly got killed, suddenly I woke up with my weapons and a box, when I gave it to Joseph, it was an Omnitrix and it latched onto his finger" I explained.

The looks on their faces told me they didn't believe me.

"So you just woke up with that box, and didn't even bother opening it?" Max asked sternly.

"Hey, I didn't even know it was an Omnitrix in there, plus there wasn't any signs of a lid or nothing!" I replied loudly.

"No need to yell…" Ben replied picking out his ear.

"Sorry Ben" I apologized.

"I'll ask Azmuth later, in the mean time, I suggest you rest and wait until your friends are getting better" Max ordered.

I froze when he mentioned that and looked at the two, "What happened to Joseph, John and Conner?" I asked hoarsely.

They all looked down sadly, "Joseph lost his leg…John is now in a coma…and…" he took a breath and exhaled, "we couldn't find Conner's body…" Max said.

I was silent for a few seconds before I chuckled, Conner, one of the guys who pushed my buttons everyday, who made fun of and joked with me, who also was a gamer and anime junkie like the rest of my friends, just...gone. "Son of a bitch…I mean I didn't like Conner...I mean I disliked the guy a lot, but I never wanted to hurt him, and yet someone else did it for me…" I then felt a jolt in my body an my eyes widened. "Ah shit! He never paid me my twenty bucks!" I yelled with realization.

Asides from the fact the others were shocked by this, they couldn't help but laugh, I laughed a bit too, but started coughing after a minute.

"Guess I'm not ready yet *cough, cough,*"

"Take it easy there man, your still weak from that explosion," Ben replied with concern in his tone.

I sighed and lay back in my bed, tired already from what happened.

"The others? Where are they?" I asked hoarsely.

"Joseph is getting a new mechanical leg, John's in another room, and Zach is right there," Max pointed to the bed next to me and I saw Zach sleeping in it.

"…Heh must've passed out…" I muttered.

We heard the door open and I looked and saw Luna and Christine in the doorway. Luna looked so different without her armor. She was wearing a dark blue and black skin-tight suit. It had a zipper with it pulled down to show some of her cleavage, had some stripes along the sleeves and wore some black arm protectors on her arms like gauntlets, with black bands on the pants and cufflinks, I was actually surprised she was a Wolfen, she looked so human…and hot…very hot…the girls on Earth would be jealous as hell…and the guys are just gawking at her, judging by their expressions when they saw her.

Christine however, wore a body suit as well, hers had shown her cleavage as well, also it showed off her curves, no doubt used by Blackwell as a way to promote her for sex appeal. She however looked to have several holsters for knives, not to mention the claw-like gauntlets, which just looked to be regular bracers. Her colors were more like gray and black, as if to compliment her hair and eyes, yet she looked so young too, maybe a young adult a year older than me, hard to say. I stared at both girls, glancing from Luna, who huffed, yet smirked, to Christine, who mewed and winked at me. I hope I don't have anesthesia in my system right now...no I felt something in my lower region, that disproves that theory. Right, better shift make sure they don't see...ok good got it.

"Luna, Christine…what are you doing here?" I asked them.

"Hold up, that's the girl who gave you her number?" Ben leaned and whispered that with a hand covering his mouth.

I smiled happily and nodded, making Ben have a double-take.

"Dude…" Ben muttered with awe as Luna passed him.

"Feeling any better?" Luna asked as she took a seat next to me on the bed, Christine flanking me on my right.

"Yeah…asides from the dull throbbing I'm good," I said casually, as if I knew her for a while now.

"Good…sorry about your friends though," Luna replied sadly, looking at Zach when she said that.

"Don't worry, Zach's strong, Joseph needed to get rid of that leg of his for a while now…and John is tolerable," I replied.

"What about that other kid, what was his name…Conner?" Luna asked while her ears twitched.

"That jackass deserved it…wish I could've been the one to kill him though…" I muttered.

"You sound like you hated him..." Christine spoke up, hands petting and patting my head, almost like a pet...mmm I likey.

"A little though, he made fun of me" I spoke truthfully, enjoying the petting. "wait I'm not a dog!" I stated looking at her.

The catgirl giggled, "I know, but you looked just so cute, like a puppy" she smiled warmly. I swear my heart skipped, her smile just looked so...beautiful.

"Mm…so what now?" she piped up, tail twitching, eyes hinted with...jealousy?

"Someone jealous?" Christine purred, tail flicking mischievously.

"I am not jealous, kitten" Luna snarled back.

"Oh really pup?" Christine replied haughtily.

"Ladies...now's not the time to argue, especially in front of a sick patient" Max chimed in calmly but sternly.

The two looked at each other, then me, I blushed and fidgeted nervously in the bed from their stares, call it stage-fright.

"Alright" Luna shrugged, "Back to my question: what will you do now?" she asked again, staring at me with those eyes of hers, those eyes that stared into my soul.

_'Well, I need to find someone to take over until I get well…but…who…'_ I thought.

"First idea is to get a new leader for the team while you are in sick-bay recovering" Max once again chimed in.

Thank you voice of reason.

"Well you got me," Ben chimed in.

"Asides from you…" I stated rather coldly. "We need more than just you, even if you got an entire team of aliens" I stated as if I was a military commander. We heard the door open again and I looked and nearly gasped when I saw who it was.

"Chris?!" I asked when I saw my big brother. My brother Chris was much taller than me, with glasses and brown eyes as well as short black hair, but he was a little chunkier than me…ok actually he was a lot chunkier than me. Actually, compared to him I'm incredibly skinny. However my brother now was wearing the Dreadlock collar on his neck, and also he wore his pendant of what looked to be a cross with fake gems in it. as for attire, just a sweatshirt and jeans, the shirt giving the impression he worked out, in actuality he was fat.

"Mark, you okay?" Chris asked as he came in.

"Yeah…but what the hell are you doing here?" I asked, still trying to comprehend how my brother got here.

"Got captured with you after they knocked you out…Mom is okay and Angel too, they watched the whole thing with Grandpa and Grandma," Chris replied smiling.

Son of a bitch…I forgot about them, hope they're alright…

_But they're safe...they're safe...thank god..._

"Guys, this is my brother Chris, Chris, these are my friends," I said and introduced them to him.

"You two look nothing alike…" Ben said after taking a few double takes between us.

"We know," both of us stated at the same time.

"So you need a temporary leader…I'm in…" Chris said crossing his arms.

"Don't worry, he's capable," I told them, "I hope…" I muttered to myself.

"I think we better go before we get in trouble, I'll be in the Suite's mission control" Max said getting off and walked out.

"I'll go check the station out, there's gotta be a place that sells some smoothies here, or chili fries, I'm hungry" Ben rubbed his stomach hungrily as he walked out after his grandpa.

"I'll get myself settled in" Chris shrugged and left, leaving me with the two girls.

I felt my heart race as I looked at the two girls, nervous, scared, I wasn't scared of women mind you...more like...I had trust issues...and bad experiences with them.

"So..." I looked at the two, trying hard not to stare at their cleavage showing...which was difficult.

"He was big" Luna spoke looking at the door.

"Yeah, I know" I grumbled.

"Don't like him?" Christine asked.

"It's...complicated, I mean he's my brother, we're supposed to be different, that's kind of why I am glad when people say how different we are" I said laying back down.

"Sounds to me like you should be proud of that" the cat-girl mused, curling next to me on the bed.

"I should huh? yet, he's older than me, picks on me...you know? He just...irritates me" I made a clenching motion with my fists to emphasize.

"But he doesn't have what you have" Luna spoke, curling as well next to me, a head resting on each of my shoulders each.

"And that is?" I glanced, crocking an eyebrow at her.

Both girls glanced at each other, smirked, then leaned their faces in close to mine.

"You got a nice scent" they both whispered in my ears, then Christine smirked, kissing me on my cheek while Luna licked my other cheek.

My face burned red, both girls giggled and left, but Christine glanced back and winked before the door shut.

I held my hands on my cheeks, then grinned widely.

"FUCK YEAH!"

* * *

><p>"And in other news, Shellshock, the original Liberator Exterminator from the original Dreadzone, has made a return with an explosive comeback, as he had managed to incapacitate Team Terraforce, who we just learned are now recovering, although one is getting a new leg and another is in a coma, arrangements for their replacements are being put underway," Josh said.<p>

"Well it seems your team isn't as strong as they said, considering Shellshock mopped the floor with them," Joanne said to Ethan.

"Hey, he cheated, isn't the Harbinger like, illegal or something?" Ethan inquired.

"Dreadzone Z is an illegal combat sport, there are no rules," Joanne stated.

"Well…except the deadlock collars and tampering with the station controls," Josh added.

"Oh right…forgot that," Joanne said and scratched her head a bit.

"So basically besides those rules, you can have a WMD and use it and not get in trouble?" Ethan asked.

"Unless you want to get into trouble with the feds on the planet you used it on, don't" Josh sternly stated.

"Killjoy, I say, blow up a city or two if you ask me" Joanne huffed.

"unlike you Joanne, I'm not a psychopath" Josh replied smiling, earning a punch from the female anchor.

"Well, I guess that's it for today folks," Josh replied rubbing his shoulder, "Until then, stay tuned for more action here on Dreadzone Z!" he said.

"And Cut!" the robot director announced, snapping the clipboard used in movies.

"Finally! Anyone want a coffee?" Josh asked.

"Eh, sure, "Joanne and Ethan both said.

* * *

><p>Blackwell was busy watching the first of his robots being finish from his desk, looking at the pile of lawsuit papers he had gotten. Apparently Shellshock's little "extermination" caused millions in property damage and deaths, not to mention everyone on the planet was protesting from the massacre. On the plus side ratings were up, thanks to Terraforce's condition, they were quickly rising in popularity, with many fans asking for status on their conditions.<p>

"Maybe I should've edited that part out..." he muttered as he soon looked up, hearing a beeping from his console, seeing he got a message. Opening up his computer, he smirked when he saw it was from his contact.

**Contact made, awaiting orders**

_Infiltrate their ranks, gather intel, make sure no one suspects anything._

**And the boy? Shall I eliminate him?**

_No, make sure he is safe, he's starting to become popular, need him alive for ratings._

**Kind of cold aren't you?**

_Just make sure he's safe, he dies on your watch, you'll join him_

**Just keep your Exterminators off him, also, Ben Tennyson and his grandson have entered the station.**

That last bit of news shocked him as his monitor showed the two in the suite, Max typing something, while Ben was eating chili fries.

"Holy shite...it's actually them..." he muttered.

**Got plans for them?**

_I might...provided you got any ideas?_

**Give me the intel first...**

_Fine..._he clicked and soon a file was being transported, the bar quickly filing up to full. _Satisfied?_

**...Yes...this will do...Also if you go against our deal, I'll make sure everyone knows your plan -Connection terminated-**

Blackwell huffed, even if he got the intel no one would care, he was just one person, Blackwell was a galactic kingpin with millions and his own private army, who would be crazy to challenge him?

* * *

><p>The figure looked at his holopad, the files opened, revealing the green and black circular symbol of the Plumbers on it. The figure smirked as he went and typed out a response.<p>

**Azara, the next world will be Azara, and get someone from Earth who the team won't mind...taking out the trash**

He finished typing and then turned to the screen, looking at the page.

"Let's find out what the Plumbers are hiding" the figure muttered as he started to press his fingers on the keyboard, the search was beginning, the prize better be worth it.

* * *

><p><strong>And there is the chapter everybody. Hope its good for you all. but who was Blackwell conversing with, how will the team handle having Ben with them? And just why was that figure after plumber intel? Well hold on tight, after the next chapter, the story is gonna kick it up a notch. So R&amp;R please!<strong>


	7. New-Old Threats

**And now, after placing Ben into the story, here's how it's gonna go down. Basically this story, while yes it has elements and characters from Omniverse, I primarily want it to involve Ultimate Alien elements, nothing against Omniverse but...why would you retcon everything from the past two series to settle on the original when you have so much potential with Ultimate alien and Alien force? I know they do callbacks, and some elements I actually like (like Zombozo being a supernatural entity) but others I don't. **

**This story is gonna primarily have ultimate alien feel to it...only darker, you'll see. And I still am gonna keep Omniverse Ben, though he'll be going through development through the interactions with my guys, it'll mainly be referenced a few times, also keeping Rook, because Rook is awesome.**

**Anyway enjoy this chapter, also Disclaimer alert, I do not own Ben 10 or any of the animes, manga, or cartoons features in here, they belong to their developers, I do own my characters and planets and stuff, anyway enjoy!**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 6: Act 1-Training (NewOld Threats)**

_"__Well, asides from the fact I was anxious to get out of the hospital, I was glad for Luna and Christine's visits, really, they're really nice when you get to know them…and hot too…uh…yeah, anyway, I've been getting posts from the videos on my blog and I'll try to answer as much as I can. *sigh* man…I never thought people would like this blog…actually I didn't know how to do this until Max showed me._

_I guess I kinda owe it to him, our group would be kinda dead without his guidance…mm…its kinda weird…but I kinda like being away from Earth, gives me time to think you know? Plus without all that war and pestilence on earth, I like it in outer space…but I also miss home too…I wonder if we'll ever be able to go back…or rather CAN we go back?"_

-Audio Log 4: Dreadzone Infirmary, 14 days after Nabrillloth Incident, Mark I.

I was in the suite's living room, watching the video feed from a planet I don't know the name of. Since our team is basically on standby, we're stuck recovering while other teams are busy fighting. I did however wonder, why did Blackwell decide to get us patched up? I just figured that he'd just kill us with the Deadlock collars; just what was he planning? I soon heard the door open as Luna came in; she sometimes visited me in the infirmary, other times it was Christine, who usually got a little close for comfort, yet I loved them and she was...very affectionate at times. I did like these visits, they did sneak some food that actually tasted good and gave it to me in place of hospital food. I wonder where Christine was today? Maybe she was busy with something, a challenge maybe.

"How are you doing?" Luna wondered as we watched the Holovision.

"Good, just watching TV since the fact we're all on recovery and I'm bored out of my mind" I joked with a grin. Luna giggled cutely as I flipped the Holovision to Earth TV, where there was a news segment on us by…oh shit Will Harangue…what's that racist reporter up to now?

"Ben Tennyson, a threat to society, now he's got some friends with these…these _freaks_ who love to kill innocents and destroy public. People of Earth, I urge you to help put a stop to this madness, I saw we banish these…monsters from our planet and-" I shut off the TV, disgusted by what Harangue said. Especially since he had used shots of the destroyed Nabrilloth City.

"If I ever get my hands on him, I'm gonna so tear him to pieces!" I yelled with a growl.

"Not all of you humans are nice huh? He sounds like a real jerk," Luna mused, huffing.

"He is, he attacked Ben to use the footage as slander, when his secret that he was all the aliens that showed up was revealed, kids loved him, adults don't trust him, yet he saved the universe, if he didn't we'd be slaves right now for some mining company or dictator empire," I said bitterly. Playing video games made me have a dark outlook on humanity in general...along with personal experiences.

Luna hummed a bit about that and we heard the door open. We saw it was Joseph, but with a humanoid replacement leg since his old one was gone. I had to admit, it did look cool, even if it had a bunch of lines common with augmentation.

"Hey dude, you look like a train hit you or something," I joked with a smile.

"Ha ha, let's see you try losing a leg to a robot homicidal maniac," Joseph said as he sat down in a chair.

Well he had us there I suppose.

"So, what happened while I was…getting operated on," Joseph asked me after finding a way to speak his question. I explained to him about what I learned since I woke up and everything that happened since.

"Wow…so…Conner's…damn…I thought you'd be the one to do it," Joseph stated nonchalantly.

"I know right?!" I replied.

"What is this, a party?" Zach asked as he came in, asides from a few stitches he had, he looked normal, despite his blonde dyed hair.

"Glad to see you're doing well," I said.

"Heh, so What'cha y'all talking about?" he asked. I explained, again I might add, about what's happened and about Will Harangue.

"I am so going to hurt him, talking shit about us…that's wrong…" Joseph said sourly.

"Yep…hey check it out," I said and turned up the volume on the TV.

"Well if you're just tuning in it appears Team Terraforce's new team just finished a new challenge in the arena and are one step closer to the Avenger Tournament. And also a chance to face Shellshock, who is already raking in the popularity like a sponge in a sink." Josh said.

Joanne just gave him a confused look, "…Right…and in other news Will Harangue has been getting much heat from Ben 10 fans across the universe that have come to worship the hero, claiming Harangue is the real villain and an embarrassment to human kind, following his recent news broadcast" Joanne spoke.

"About time!" I said cheerfully.

"Yeah, take that Harangue!" Joseph called back.

"Well seems like you guys have been feeling better," Max said as he walked in.

"Hey Max, yeah we are, plus they just dissed Will Harangue," I said with a grin.

"Oh him, I'll never appreciate what he did to Ben and to our state's capitol, if only he didn't get away with what he did…" Max said.

"Yeah…when I meet him I'm gonna give him a piece of my mind and a foot shoved right up his ass," I said and pounded my fist into my hand.

"Ha-ha, reminds me of myself when I was your age, the whole rebellious type and all, minus the vulgar language" Max chuckled.

"Heh, but we have more rock music now then when you were a teenager, especially Rise Against…awesome band ever…" I grinned.

"Right, so, training?" Max asked. We looked at each other then at Max.

"Uh, sure…" we said.

"Alright then, Luna, are you coming?" Max asked her.

"Well, only to see how you humans fight," Luna said with a shrug. I had followed Max to the gym, which was filled with equipment for various species that were here, ranging from dumbbells and other Earth exercise equipment, to alien kinds of equipment that I had no idea how to make them work. I wonder if there were places on Earth where they had these? The next few hours were of the rest of us training with each other in one of the training rooms. It was hard, but…okay, it sucked, I kept getting hit and I tried my hardest to block and attack, but I tire out easily from my asthma and my punches didn't do any hits.

God I'm so weak.

"Well, at least there are some humans that know how to fight," Luna said, obviously trying not to sound too hurtful after seeing my sparring.

"Shut up," I grumbled at her.

"Hey, hey, no need to be a grouch…" she retorted. I growled at her and she smirked with a sense of accomplishment, then her ears shot up with an idea.

"Tell you what, meet me here later when the others are asleep," Luna said to me.

"Why?" I asked. Her wolf ears flattened and she gave me a look that said 'are you stupid or something?' which was what I bet she wanted to ask me.

"I'm going to train you to become stronger," Luna replied.

"Oh…but why?" I asked her again, my brain trying to comprehend what she just said.

"I could tell that you have a good heart and want to be stronger, but you don't know if you can…or you're lazy," Luna explained.

I moaned from that in annoyance, "What time?" I asked her, defeated.

"Hmm…how about eight o'clock sound good? Assuming you don't have anything?" Luna asked with a flirty gleam in her eyes.

"Well…I did start a blog a while back, explaining a few things about what's going on, venting a bit, that sort of thing," I replied with a quick shrug.

"Oh, give me the website, I'll check it out sometime," Luna said. I nodded, writing down the name and giving it to her.

"There you go, wait what about Christine?" I asked quickly.

"She's off doing a challenge so she'll be busy, or sleeping off the challenge when she gets back if she's ok, so we're safe" she added and took the slip, slipping it in her cleavage teasingly.

"Thanks, remember, eight!" She said, winking at me as she left.

…YES!

"Wow, you scored big time…" John said as he, Ben and my brother appeared.

"Uh…how long were you guys there?" I asked them, concerned.

"The whole time," Ben said simply.

"Okay…" I said with a quick sigh.

"Come on, we'll have to have a little talk," Chris said and all but dragged me.

"God damn it…" I muttered with dread over what the conversation was going to be about.

* * *

><p><strong>Dreadzone Z Station- Training Room 5, 8:00 p.m.<strong>

I arrived at the Training Room like Luna had asked me…god it's scary when its dark, no time to be a pansy…where's Luna? I soon remembered the talk my brother gave me about what to do with a woman when alone, then Max came in and just gave me simple advice of just being myself. I'm trying hard to burn that discussion with my brother out of my mind...damn it go away!

"Boo!" a voice spoke from behind me. I swear to God I nearly jumped out of my armor and turned to the wolf girl.

"Don't do that!" I told her, "You almost gave me a heart attack!" I added with some yelling. She giggled from my freak out and put a finger to my lips.

"Shush, you don't want to wake up the whole station…come on," she said and walked off. I decided to follow her, since I just saw something move from the corner of my eye and I had a feeling it was hungry. I soon followed her to some sort of bio-dome place in the station. It held large trees and plants that looked and reminded me of the trees from Earth, only these trees were huge, with giant roots spanning over the place like a jungle.

"This is where some races come to train their survival skills, not to mention combat skills," Luna explained. I looked around and could tell two things, one was that we humans are really weak compared to every other species, and the second was that I was probably gonna get creamed.

"And you brought me here why?" I asked Luna.

"To train you, think fast!" she said and tried to land a punch on me. I blocked it instinctively, and she threw some more punches, then a kick, I managed to block some punches but was on my back after the kick.

"Get up and try again," Luna said offering a hand to help me up. I sighed and took it, this wasn't going to be easy, in fact I think I am gonna be needing a ice pack.

**Luna's POV**

I was thankful Christine came back tired from her challenge, it let me go and train with Mark, though if she could she'd join us, maybe I'll let her join and give us a chance at two-on-one fights. I had helped Mark train with basic punches, but given how tired he became after a few minutes, which barely would've constituted a workout for me or any normal person, I was curious. How exactly can someone be so weak, unless he barely worked out. I had nothing against him or his kind, but why aren't they making their people exercise often? At least with Wolfens and the other Animali we are encouraged to work out and stay in shape.

"Mark, I need to ask, and don't take this the wrong way, but…how is it you managed to survive all this, yet you can barely throw a punch?" I asked curiously while sitting next to him on the ground, staring up at the artificial ceiling above the dome. The artificial starlight did remind me of my home, but it wasn't real, just an imitation.

"Well…" Mark panted heavily and glanced at me, "It's because of my asthma…it's a…a condition I got…it prevents me from actually going out and doing fun things like…running, or jogging, or sports" he explained as he tried to catch his breath. "That…and I don't go out much" he added. "I am not an outdoors person, the most I did besides school is go get the mail" he added once more.

The last part was obvious enough, given his stickly arms and weak muscle mass, not to mention his pale complexion. "Oh…" I muttered. Of course he had a hard time doing athletic things with asthma, I heard of it, and some friends of mine had the same problem he did. You'd think someone on Earth would've cured it by now…

Unless…

"Mark…is there a cure for asthma?" I asked curiously.

The terran looked at me, and then sighed sadly, I took the hint, but he explained anyway. "No…we're too busy fighting each other for things like resources, or fighting our own people in our countries to pass bills others don't want passed…not to mention dealing with problems that aren't ours" he muttered darkly.

Now it was making sense, his people…but the tone he said that in, it sounded…hateful…angry almost.

"But...surely they're trying, right?" I asked, hopeful for something good.

"No…" again he dashed that up nicely, "If we had a cure for cancer, or STDs, we'd have to either pay huge sums to get a vaccination, or they'd hide it…I've learned to live with this, so what if I can't run fast like everyone else? So what if I can't play basketball or soccer like everyone else? I don't care, I like being who I am, a video gamer, anime enthusiast, shut-in lone wolf guy" Mark declared, staring right at me in a serious glare.

Wow does this kid have issues, "Sounds like you hate everyone…" I mused and twirled my tail on the ground.

"You don't know the whole truth about it…" I heard him mumble.

"Looks like there's an underlying problem here…I think sparring might help you let it out" I smirked and got up, offering a hand to him.

He looked up, then shrugged it off, "if it helps I think I'll sit this one out for now" he said politely, even if it did sound hurtful.

Well too bad for him, I don't go easy on my partners, hoisting him up against his will, I got into a stance, with him sighing and getting into a mock stance of his own.

"You aren't getting off that easy" I smirked and threw the first punch at him.

* * *

><p><strong>Mark's POV<strong>

My god that was painful, who knew Wolfens could hit that hard? Luna agreed we'd keep training in secret afterhours, but now I was glad to get some sleep. Though, when I headed to my room I thought I spied someone…nah just my imagination. I rubbed my aching shoulder, despite my own knuckles feeling like they'd break off at any moment from delivering the punches.

Ow, god I'm going to feel that one in the morning. I sighed, wheezing a bit from my asthma still lingering, why did I have to be cursed like this, I wonder? Well I pushed a button, retracting my armor into a pin that was the Dreadzone Z logo and showered, brushed my teeth, then hit the hay, shutting off my light as I did.

* * *

><p>The man was wearing a dark green trench coat an dark brown pants with black boots, goggles, had white hair that seemed to compliment his almost sickly olive green skin tone, but didn't bother hiding the fact his brain was showing in a jar on his head nor the antenna-like digits on top. This man, was Doctor Aloysius James Animo, a infamous scientist who was a regular adversary of Ben Tennyson.<p>

The doctor turned his face, as if addressing a camera, "Now some may wonder, 'how did Animo escape Plumber HQ?' Well it was rather complex manner of sneaking, and a brilliant tactical mind, and given my intellect the manner of escape was simple. Plus given the Plumber's track record, it's fairly simple to escape if the force field surrounding it can be fooled." he spoke to his reflection.

"And now you may wonder, how was it that I was able to leave Earth? Well my fine spectators, it was the simple manner, of making a call to the right people, to an...interested party" Dr. Animo replied. He soon began to walk through the hallways of the station, he had gotten a call from the man behind Dreadzone Z and he wanted to speak with him personally. He did have to admit this place was amazing; this would take years in Earth to build.

_'__Our technology is very primitive compared to these aliens, perhaps I may have a use for all their DNA,'_ he thought as he soon arrived at the office of the director. He was surprised to see it was a lion alien, but then again with Ben Tennyson, he had to expect he and his new friends associated with races like him.

"Alright, I'm guessing you're the one who called me?" Dr. Animo asked the Director.

"Why yes I did, please sit, shall I get you anything?" Alistair asked, surprising the doctor with his fluent English accent.

"Uh…no thank you, so what did you wish to talk with me about?" He asked.

"Well, I assume you know of Ben Tennyson?" Alistair asked him.

"Who hasn't? That little punk has been a thorn in my side for years, ever since he was a kid" The doctor spoke, remembering all the humiliating defeats that he suffered at the hands of the hero from the age of ten till now.

Alistair started laughing at that, picturing the famous savior of the universe as a ten year old beating doctor Animo, it was kind of funny really.

"Reasons aside, I require your help" Alistair replied once he finished laughing.

"And you want my help why?" Dr. Animo cocked an eyebrow and crossed his arms.

"Well, you despise Ben 10 as much as a thousand other people in the criminal underworld do, how about we make a deal, I help you get rid of Ben 10 and team Terraforce, you become my spokesman for my corporation and get to use your experiments to give my show higher ratings, sounds like a deal?" Blackwell said, offering a hand to him.

"Hmm..." The Doctor pondered on this, on the one hand he would be using his experiments for a sociopath, on the other, he can get rid of Ben 10 and also get funding for his experiments. "It sounds like a reasonable offer, but give me another reason to agree with you" he stated.

"Because if you don't, I will have you arrested for going against a universal icon"

"Universal icon, Ben Tennyson? Sure I mean he's famous the world over, but universal?" Animo asked, confused as well as surprised.

"You didn't think I'd call you here without some…insurance to cooperate?" Blackwell asked as a mini-monitor on his desk showed the footage of Animo trying to kill Ben with the various experiments and other genetic creations he used.

Animo paled when he saw the footage, the unedited footage, his first thought was how he got that feed, the second thought was why he didn't edit out his failures, making him watch them over and over...wait this gave him an idea. "How did you get that?" he asked coldly.

"I got sources, so, shall we make our deal?" Blackwell asked once again, offering his hand.

Animo sighed, "Deal…" he muttered and shook his hand, Blackwell smirking happily with his success.

"However, I require a suitable lab for my equipment and time for my experiments to become useable, also the videos you have, I wish to study them, to find any weakness in Ben Tennyson's arsenal" he explained.

"Done"

"Excellent! Mr. Blackwell, I believe this is the beginning of a very useful partnership" Animo said shaking the director's hand.

"Indeed" he replied smiling. _'Maybe for me more than you'_ he thought.

* * *

><p>None of them had noticed another person spying on them, one who heard everything, and now was determined to take manners into his own hands...<p>

* * *

><p><strong>Well, that was a shock huh? Bet none of you expected that. I had planned for Will Harangue to take his place, but I figured, 'eh, lets add Dr. Animo instead' given his history with Ben. Plus I don't think that Harangue would be ok with working with aliens given his agendas. anyway R&amp;R and stay tuned for more!<strong>


	8. Rage

**And now at least, the next chapter, this is gonna be fun, especially with the Doctor involved. I originally thought of having Will Harangue in this story, though after much deliberations, I switched him for Dr. Animo since it just worked better. Anyway enjoy the chapter. I had to completely redo this entire chapter due to one character change.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 7: Act 1-Azara (Rage)<strong>

_"__Azara…This is where everything started to go to hell for us…or was the prequel for it…I still couldn't wrap my head around it until a while after that planet. But that's when I was able to give the good doctor an ass kicking he deserved...but...after that...I wish I could forget._

-Audio Log 5: Azara, Mark I.

* * *

><p>Alright, I woke up to pain in parts of my body after my midnight training session with Luna, but I forced myself out of bed and to the bathroom. I looked myself over in the mirror; well I shaved off my mustache and goatee so now I look younger, but asides from the cuts and dried up blood on my face I looked okay.<p>

After brushing my teeth, showering and getting a new change of clothes on, I pressed the Dreadzone Z symbol on my chest (I forgot to mention, the armor can retract into a pendant, once pressed it'll become the armor again) and my armor came on. I went to the lobby and met the others, all ready as well.

"Morning…" I grumbled. The gang all mumbled a 'hey' back to me.

"So…anyone know what planet we're going to next?" I asked as I sat down in a chair.

"Nah, we're supposed to learn soon…hungry?" Joseph asked. A few raised hands and some chatter later we were in the mess hall eating some breakfast.

"Well asides from us nearly getting killed almost every campaign planet we're on, this is kinda nice, we're living on our own, away from Earth, I could get used to this," I said as I took another bite from my stack of pancakes.

The others agreed with me, "Yeah, Earth sucks, I like it out here," Zach said.

"Mm…I wonder…will we ever be able to go back to Earth?" I said to them. They started thinking the same thing, even if we destroy Dreadzone, would we be welcomed back? Would we be ridiculed, hated, despised, and possibly experimented on? The thoughts of what would happen seemed to dim our moods…until…

"Hey boys…what's wrong?" Luna asked. I turned to look at her, but now I was staring at her outfit. She was wearing the same armor as last time I saw her, wow, she's got great curves…oh god I'm a pervert.

"You like what you boys see huh?" Luna smirked when she saw our looks.

"I'm currently dating Julie right now," Ben said hastily.

"Shame, well I hope you two are very happy together," Luna said as she sat down with us.

"Probably won't, I can tell Ben's going to be having an...interesting experience with women" Christine mused as she walked in, earing a few whistles from other competitors as she sat next to us. Hearing those whistles made me feel...angry, how dare they do that to her...wait am I...getting jealous?

"So Luna, Christine…what brings you two here?" I asked them once the heat from my face went down.

"Well wanted to see how you were doing and saw the looks on your faces, something wrong?" Luna asked while eating on a pancake slice.

"Well…" I began to say.

"We're just a little homesick is all," Chris responded.

"You're not the only ones…" Luna muttered sadly. I cocked an eyebrow and looked at her confused, then noticed the looks on both their faces, they were homesick too.

"You miss your home?" I asked her.

"Most people miss their home, now they're praying they'll live to get out one day…" Christine replied softly.

"Oh…" I muttered, feeling like a big jerk.

"_Team Terraforce, Team Twin Claw please report to the Planetary transport for departure to Azara," _the intercom blared.

"Well, guess we gotta go," I said as we all got up.

"Not without us" Christine smirked as she and Luna both got up. "We're Team Twin Claw remember? So seems like we're going to be working together today" she added, hooking an arm around mine playfully.

"You lucky son of a bitch..." I heard Joseph reply from behind me, obviously jealous.

"Yeah, yeah get used to it!" I snarked back and began walking.

Luna sighed, "I swear she's going to spoil him" she shrugged and followed her teammate out the cafeteria.

"Hey Mark, just curious but...have you ever killed anyone?" she asked suddenly as we walked.

I turned to her, surprised by her question, "No, have you?" I ask.

"I asked you first"

"No I did"

"He's never killed anyone" Chris replied walking past us.

"Oh, so your a virgin then" Christine giggled.

I swear she is teasing me, I felt my blood rush to my head, trying to hide my nervousness.

"It's ok, killing is a part of life, some enjoy it, others hate it, and there are those that have to kill to survive" the catgirl stated sage-like.

"Have you killed?" I asked. She went quiet, it was like that for several seconds which made me think it was minutes, until she spoke.

"We have during our career, been forced to kill people, other competitors mostly. I don't like thinking about it much, but we gotta survive, right?" she asked staring at me with those eyes of her.

I went quiet, I thought about it, what she went through, it must've been hard on her.

"I'm sorry..." I mutter softly.

"Don't blame yourself, it gets easier after a while, but you don't have to kill, not unless its in self defense or anything, just hope you're prepared to pull the trigger when you have the advantage" she replied ruffling my hair, going ahead while I stopped.

"Could I really do it?" I looked at my reflection, asking myself, could I be a killer? Or would I be made into one?

"Only one way to find out..." I mutter and ran ahead.

We all headed to the Planetary Transport as the green cone of energy lifted us inside the interior, but I still couldn't forget what Christine said. Killing someone isn't a joke, its serious, a line that can never be crossed back if I took it. But could I really justify killing a person?

_'__I only hope there's another way when the time comes…'_ I thought.

* * *

><p>Dr. Animo meanwhile was with Alistair in his room, crossing his arms.<p>

"So, are your experiments ready?" Alistair asked, staring at he mad doctor.

"You cannot rush genius, but thankfully with the generous donations you're provided me, I've been able to upgrade my mutation helmet so it can convert alien life into mutations, granted I must run tests on it first" The doctor explained.

"Don't you worry, you will" Alistair said as a robotic worker appeared rushing into the room.

"Are the experiments aboard?" Animo inquired to the worker.

"Your experiments are safely inside the cages, just press this button on this controller and you do the rest" the worker said and left them.

"Good, so where's the planet I'm going to in order to test?" he asked asked.

"Azara, a planet full of people who came there from many wars plaguing their home worlds and is considered a 'Refugee world' by many," Alistair said. Dr. Animo smirked and rubbed his hands together, chuckling evilly as he left to get himself ready.

"And make sure Ben Tennyson does not see me while I work!" Animo popped his head in from the door way.

Alistair gave a thumbs up as Animo left, then switched to a screen where he saw the loading bay, then watched as the doctor was soon put in a transport shuttle and heading to Azara.

"You're not going to edit the footage are you?" Shellshock asked as he and the others Exterminators appeared.

"Hell no, I'm going to broadcast everything live, when Ben falls, so will the Earth," Alistair said confidently.

"That's low even for you," Rainier stated coldly.

"The humans have primitive technology, it's pathetic," Alistair snarled. "besides, we got the info from the doctor's research, we have no need for him anymore." he added.

"…Unless Mark gets to Animo first…" Fenrir spoke up.

Now that idea was something they didn't count on.

"Still, it'll get ratings," Alistair shrugged. The other Exterminators all shrugged and soon went off to do their own things.

No one noticed a shadowy figure was watching from a control pad, seeing and hearing everything from his little bug he planted.

"Guess its my turn..." he man muttered before vanishing.

* * *

><p>The Planetary Transport hovered over one of the many islands of Azara. Azara itself was a planet surrounded by water with many islands. The inhabitants were people (humanoid aliens and other alien species from what I read on the Plumber's Database) who were refugees from wars that occurred on their home planets, or whose worlds were destroyed in the war with the Plumbers and another organization, or other intergalactic wars. Apparently this place is one of many refugee worlds, and this place had at least a few continents, maybe like five or 8 or something.<p>

I looked from the window of our bunk, which was just a room with a bathroom, two couches, a Holovision, and some chairs for us, even a medical station and a bed. Seems like home…only in space. I also saw Azara's islands looked like favelas and some like European cities, and some like sprawling capital cities. Wow, talk about diverse.

"Man, this place is beautiful," I said as I looked at it.

"Azara, home to a diverse range of alien life, from poverty stricken favelas to sprawling metropolises, this place has it all," Jimmy Jones, the 10-year-old kid who revealed Ben's secret and a fan of his, explained from the Holovision at his house.

"How did you get here anyway?" Joseph asked him.

"Oh, I managed to hack into the television waves that Dreadzone Z was broadcasting from a satellite orbiting the Earth, it's pretty simple," Jimmy said with a confident smile.

"Hmm…can you hack the video bots that work for Dreadzone Z?" Ben asked him.

"Sure Ben, but why?" Jimmy asked.

"If Blackwell is going to be plan anything here and tries to kill me and lie, we'll show the whole universe the footage of the fight as blackmail," Ben said with a smirk.

"Wow…that does sound so dirty and evil…let's do it!" I said with enthusiasm. That's when an idea hit me, "Hey Jimmy, you happen to got any videos of Nabrilloth that Blackwell didn't edit?" I asked jimmy.

Jimmy typed some things in his computer and nodded.

"Yeah…let me guess, you want to show the Earth the unedited footage and get him in trouble, don't you?" Jimmy asked.

"Yep…" I smirked.

"Heh, I like this guy already, he's like a younger me," Kevin Levin said from the Holovision, causing it to split between Jimmy's half of the screen and Kevin's.

"Glad to see you too Kevin, so, what's going on now?" Ben asked.

"Asides from the fact every guy who wants you dead is trying to takeover Bellwood, its normal," Kevin replied. "Also classes here are getting boring, mostly they're showing the newest episodes of Dreadzone Z here, you got people rooting for you guys out there" he added looking at our group.

"And Julie?" Ben asked.

"She's fine, no one tried to attack her yet," Kevin told him. Ben smiled with relief, but now something was on my mind.

"How is everyone taking the fact we're on universal TV?" I asked him, "And don't even lie man!" I stated before I gave Kevin a chance to speak.

"Well…most people think you'll die in the Tournament and many just want you guys dead…some are even considering you 'freaks' and Mark as a psycho," Jimmy spoke up.

"I smash a robot with a wrench and everyone's afraid of me…just like Will Harangue…" I grumbled bitterly.

"It's not your fault kid, if you were being forced to fight for everyone entertainment, I'd be well, kind of ok with it, don't know about you though" Kevin said to me.

"Well I don't want to fight!" I yelled.

"You're not the only one," everyone else replied.

* * *

><p>The Transport landed and we were teleported onto the surface. Looks like we're in some sort of European village kind of place, this reminds me of that Dumary Island from Devil May Cry 2. Hmm…I wonder…<p>

"So what do we do now?" Ben asked.

"Guess we wait?" I shrug and looked around, we were in a square of sorts for the town. Looking at it now, I saw it was a mix between old-style architecture and having things such as antenna and paved roads, reminded me of the pictures of Rome's streets. I soon decided to wander around, given the fact we're not on air yet, might as well get used to the lay of the land.

"Alright everyone split up, get a lay of the land, meet back here in an hour" I ordered. They all nodded and we all split, my brother and I together, Joseph and Ben together, and Christine and Luna together.

While we were splitting up, the Dreadzone Z blimp loomed over the skies, they were already on, and were already broadcasting.

"Well today looks to be a beautiful day here on Azara, don't you think Josh? Ethan?" Joanne asked her male co-anchors.

"Indeed, this beautiful refugee world is hold to millions of refugees that have been displaced by war, that over the generations made this world home, now some have returned to their homeworlds, others however stayed and made this place their home, little history lesson for you humans Ethan" Josh stated to his human coworker.

Ethan was a slightly large young adult with brown curly hair wearing a fancy suit issued to him as his outfit to work as an announcer. Ethan was a good friend of Mark and his friends, well mostly Mark, as they ate lunch together.

"Thanks Josh, and yeah, this world sounds a lot like Earth...only slightly cleaner" he replied.

"Well its about to get a whole lot messier, just watch" Joanne smirked.

I looked around the town, standing close by my brother's side, call it a childhood fear, but I was afraid of this place, of all the events that have happened till now. At least now I can relax before we go down into hell again.

"Hey, you ok?" Chris asked, a hint of concern in his tone when he looked at me.

"Just nervous" I muttered softly.

He looked at me, then looked ahead and began walking to the fountain, then stopped. "Stay here" he stated, gesturing to the fountain, "I'll be right back" he said, treating me as if I was still a child to him before disappearing into the crowd.

I sighed and sat down by the fountain's edge, staring at the water. "I'm not a child..." I muttered staring at my reflection in the water. I listened instead to the words in the crowds, despite the random talk, I caught onto bits of conversations, bits about us...about me.

"...is that him?"

"The boy from Earth, he looks so young..."

"I hear he's a serial killer, according to Dreadzone Z's news reports"

"But he's just a kid, he looks harmless..."

"I heard he's friends with Ben 10, THE Ben 10!"

"Think he'll give an autograph if I ask?"

"Don't go near him, he's probably disease ridden or something..."

"We shouldn't say that, he can hear us probably"

"Doubtful, he's too busy staring at himself"

The same drabble, the same boring drabble, no matter where I went I kept hearing that, and the insults...*sigh* why the hell is it no matter where I go there were people who still seems to believe lies said by people like Blackwell. I huffed a bit and looked around, "Bro where are you?" I mutter.

"Uh excuse me, are you Mark?" I heard a voice ask, looking I saw a group of girls, wearing normal clothing, similar to Earth culture clothing, maybe they're visiting from Earth?

"Yeah, why?" I ask, trying not to sound rude, though my tone was slightly...hostile. "Sorry just a bit upset, what can I do for you three?" I asked slightly nicer.

"We were wondering if we can have your autograph?" the lead girl asked.

I blinked, surprised, but held a hand out to take the pad they held, and blinked again in surprise. The picture was of our group, me in front, Joseph to my right, John my left, Zach and Frankie behind them, and behind us was a logo of a planet, and inside the planet was a black fist raised high.

"Who made this?" I exclaimed with surprise.

"Some fans did when they saw your team, we thought it would be cool if you can sign it" the lead female replied.

I looked at it, smiling, it _did_ look good, I shrugged and began writing my signature to the girls, handing the pad to them, who all squealed happily and left.

"That felt good" I mused.

"Handing out autographs already? guess you're going to be attending fancy parties next?" Chris called, holding two ice creams in his hand as he sat down with me on the fountain.

"Not yet but getting there, but I'm not much for the parties" I mused and ate my ice cream in content. Looking around, this place reminded me of old style European squares back home, or maybe Rome to be precise, hard to say; But I ate my ice cream, I looked at my brother.

"Brother...did...did Blackwell do anything to the house?" I asked nervously.

I saw him stop eating, then closed his eyes and sighed sadly, already I know this is bad news.

"I barely got out with mom and angel...but he burned the house once he got you" he stated.

I stared at him, stunned, my ears, already bad with hearing, struggled to hear him again, "what?" I asked, wanting him to clarify, but I knew what he said.

"He took you while you were unconscious, and was burning it down, I managed to get mom and angel to grandpa's to safety, but I went back and offered myself as a contestant in exchange for your life" he stated.

I stared at my ice cream, then my brother, then my ice cream. I should've felt worried, disgust even, but he managed to get mom and our dog out, so my rage was diminished.

"As long as they're safe...but..." I groaned, "God damn it, all my stuff!" I whined softly.

"I know man...I know..." Chris patted my back, sniffing a bit.

"Aww that's so cute, I think I'm going to barf" Joanne pretended to gag from the brotherly moment.

"Man you really are a cold hearted bitch aren't you?" Ethan replied casually, the other male co-anchor and the robots all bolted out before Joanne blew a gasket.

"What did you say you fat shit?!" Joanne yelled, eyes burning red.

* * *

><p>Joseph and Ben were both walking through the streets, unfortunately Ben got swarmed by fans almost immediately after they left the group. Joseph too got some fans though many were just checking Joseph out due to the crowd around Ben being so huge. Most of them were just inspecting their Omnitrixes to see if they were real. Ben and Joseph both quickly transformed into XLR8 and bolted away, hiding in an alley dumpster and waited till they were safe, then got out, brushing garbage off them.<p>

"Man does this always happen to you?" Joseph asked.

"Most of the time it does" Ben replied, tossing a banana peel off his hoodie.

"Then most of the time I'm fighting a big bad, mostly its been Dr. Animo or Psyphon" he added.

"Dr. Animo? Who's that?" Joseph asked curiously.

Just then they heard screaming and explosions, looking back from the entrance to the alley, they ran ahead and saw what looked to be a gigantic mutated rat rampaging around the city. And riding on top of it was the doctor himself, laughing as he held onto the reins of the rat mutant while it destroyed everything.

"That's Dr. Animo" Ben stated as he transformed into Four-arms and ran on. Joseph looked at his Omnitrix, then smirked, "Diamondhead!" he yelled, green light enveloping him then soon transforming him into the Petrosapien.

The duo soon launched an attack, Ben hitting the rat mutant and Joseph slamming his fists into the ground, causing spikes of crystal to shoot up and further hit the rat and encase it in it to prevent it from moving.

"What?! Who dares!" Animo yelled then gaped seeing Ben and Joseph, "What?! There are two of you?!" he looked between the two as they reverted to their normal forms.

"Hey Doc, remember me?" Ben asked smirking.

"How?! how did you get here? I was sure not to be followed! Yet somehow you keep on following me!" Animo yelled.

Both wearers looked at each other, Joseph just shrugged to Ben, "Dude, I just got here, what are YOU doing here anyway? How'd you even escape Plumber HQ?" Ben asked.

"Funny you should ask Mr. Tennyson, for all the talk of the red spots, their security needs work, true they have a force field surrounding the complex, but a man of my intellect managed to escape the facility, there was also the fact that I was invited to participate on Dreadzone Z in return for amnesty" the doctor explained.

"Wait, so did you escape or got your sentence lowered?" Joseph asked.

"Both, they gave me the offer and I accepted, as for escaping, let's just say you should consider your recruits carefully" the doctor stated.

Before anyone could ask, Animo glanced at a group of three alien girls and shot a beam at the them, transforming them, mutating them each of them, much to Ben and Joseph's horror, more so to Mark, who had arrived shortly before to see the same girls from before who asked for his autograph, becoming mutated reflections of themselves.

* * *

><p>I gasped and stared, a cold pit growing in my stomach when I saw this weird doctor just mutant the three women that just asked me for an autograph a few minutes ago. I stared at the alien women mutations, one was a dark blue looking reptile with razor sharp talons and spikes, hissing and snarling at us, the second a canary yellow colored mutation that seemed similar to a dog or rat hybrid. The final woman was a mutated bat looking creature, hissing and screeching at us.<p>

"Now my lovely ladies, destroy Ben Tennyson and his friends!" the doctor gestured to the group.

The trio all screeched and launched, the bat girl flew at us and attempted to scratch at Joseph, but a quick yell of "XLR8!" and soon Joseph was zooming around the bat girl. Ben looked and quickly transformed into an eyeless orange looking dog creature and attack the dog/rat mutation. That just left me and my brother with the lizard mutation.

I tried to get my weapons, but staring at the lizard that was once just a normal person...I...I couldn't do it...I can't hurt her.

"Mark look live!" I heard Chris yell, snapping me out of my trance just as the lizard shot at me and made a lunge, I yelled and dodged out of the way of its attack, already panting, mostly from the fear rather than the exertion. The lizard hissed and shot its tongue out like a chameleon, I barely dodged it as it latched onto a wall and it shot back.

*CLANG!* my body felt numb after I got collided by a lamp post from the return trip.

"Ow...that hurt" I groaned, my vision blurring from the impact. I got up, wobbling around as I saw the mutations fighting my friends. I had to help them, but these people were people, maybe...wait, if I can get that doctor...I looked, seeing the Doctor was busy mutating random people with the two antenna on his head, that's it!

I grabbed my weapons and quickly was busy trying not to get noticed by the doctor or the mutations, Dr. Animo was busy ordering the mutations to destroy everything, god its worse than Nabrilloth.

As soon as I started running, he noticed me, "Do you really think you can sneak up on me?!" he yelled and held his temples, "Attack him!" I heard a screech and suddenly got plucked out of the ground by a bird mutation. The bird person held me in its talons as I saw the ground rapidly grow smaller, making my vertigo activate. I struggled trying to make it let go of me, yet with the fact I have no ground to land on...I'm screwed.

"Come on drop him already and make him a splatter on the pavement!" Joanne yelled anxiously.

Dr. Animo looked at the harpy creature he made and snapped his fingers, forcing it to let go of its prey.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" I yelled and soon saw the ground fast approaching.

"Guys! help!" I yelled into my mic.

_"Ben! Get Mark!"_ Max yelled.

Ben looked up seeing the falling shadow of Mark and he soon switched to Astrodactyl and flew up, catching the leader, "Gotcha!" Ben said, making people cheer.

**"You ok?"** he asked me, while I was clutching onto him out of sheer fear.

"Just get me down!" I exclaimed shivering.

The hero complied and landed, allowing me off as I clutched the ground, "Oh thank god...sweet ground" I sighed with relief.

"Man you have a lot of issues dude," Ben replied turning to normal.

"Do not start with me please..." I stated and sat down wanting to calm down. "But we gotta take down Animo, if we can maybe these people will go back to normal" I point out.

"Dude, that'll be easy, watch this" Ben smirked and transformed again into Diamondhead.

**"Watch and learn"** he spoke and soon shot up on a crystal spire, then shot several shards at Dr. Animo, the shards missed and impaled onto the ground, missing the Doctor.

"You'll have to try better than that!" he yelled and ordered the bird mutation to attack Ben. Ben looked up and shot more shards, knocking it out of the air, but not injuring it a it landed on the ground.

"Easy Ben, they're still people" I pointed out.

**"I know, I'm trying not to hurt them"** he called back as he slammed and cause crystal to wrap and bind up the mutated alien.

Before I could say anything I heard a screech and looked, seeing the blue lizard being swung around by Luna and let go, sending it flying and Christine soon punched it hard, causing it to slide and stumble, crashing into a building that had "empty building, condemned for demolition" written on it and it crashed, causing the whole place to crumble.

"Damn, I am good" Christine smirked. I stared at her and Luna, those two were like mother fucking amazons, both hot yet freaking deadly in a fight. I felt my heart race in my chest, good thing I had my helmet on, it made the blush creeping on my face hidden.

_'Oh my god...I think I'm developing a crush on them...'_ I thought.

"Hey mark, quit staring at the eye-candy and help us out!" Joseph called as he dodged another attack by the dog mutation.

Beating down all curses aimed to him, I ran to Christine, wanting to help her and Luna as much as possible, wanting to be of use to this fight.

"Need a hand?" I asked Christine once I got to her.

"It'd be nice" she said looking at a new mutation of a snake creature, seriously how can he mutate aliens into these things?

"I hate snakes..." I muttered and dodged the snake's lunging, I shot it with my bullets, having them set to 'stun' instead of 'kill', I can't hurt them.

"You're not the only one" I heard Christine said as she punched the snake mutation's sides, dodging its tail slashes at us.

"Any ideas?" I asked Christine, panting heavily as my asthma kicked in, fuck not now!

"Not really" she panted, "you ok?" she asked, noticing my panting and wheezing.

"f-fine" I stated weakly, then my eyes widened as I saw the snake hiss and lunged, "behind you!" I yelled.

No matter how a catgirl's reaction time is, she didn't have time to react when the snake lunged and sank its fangs into her, the armor getting pierced by one jab of its fangs into her side. Her yell rang out into my helmet, as if it made the scream she let out more amplified in it. The snake mutation slammed her against the wall, spider webs of cracks appeared from the impact as it let go of her and hissed, preparing to eat her.

Staring at Christine's limp form filled every fiber of my being with unbridled anger, the corners of my eyes tinting red, my body in auto pilot as I charged in and punched the snake in its mouth, "Not today!" I screamed and smashed my fist onto its face, the impact making it skid away and crashed into Dr. Animo.

I panted, fist shaking from the impact, had it not been encased in armor it wouldn't have made much of an impact on it.

"Did Mark just deck that snake in the face?" Ethan asked, looking battered, scratched up and beaten by Joanne.

"Dunno, let's look" Josh replied, making the camera rewind and repeat the scene where Mark punched the snake, but it replayed it first at normal speed, then fast, and finally slow motion, showing the snake's maw crumbling and even a fang falling out from impact.

"Ssssh, ouch" Josh winced watching the repeat in slow motion.

"Guess when he wants the girl, he will destroy anything that gets in his way" Ethan replied smirking.

"Indeed" Josh said folding his hands together.

Joanne rolled her eyes, "Tch men, see a few curves and suddenly they go all gaga..." she muttered. The two males glanced her way, making her blush, "not that I care!" she exclaimed.

I knelt down, shaking Christine anxiously, "wake up, come on Christine I know you're too badass enough not to get done in by a fucking snake beast!" I stated, panting.

Luna ran and knelt down, checking her wounds and looked at her team mate, concern written over her face. "Christine...come on girl I know you're tougher than this" she said softly.

We saw her eyes twitch and they opened slowly, but full of pain, "Of course, I'm a bakeneko after all" she said weakly. We both sighed with relief, then I hardened my senses and got up, looking to the snake as Dr. Animo got up.

"Stay here" I said and began to walk to where the doctor was, rage taking complete control now as I grabbed him by his collar, "C'mere you" I said dragging him out and slammed him onto the ground.

I grabbed his helmet, the antenna on his head firmly in my grip, and ripped them off, "not again!" I heard him exclaim as I tossed the fragments away. The mutations soon reverted back to normal alien people, unconscious, but no worse for the wear.

Seeing the people were safe, I stared at the doctor, who was attempting to get away. "No way!" I yelled, pulling out my gun dagger and shooting it, the bullet hitting Animo's leg and causing him to yell, clutching his leg as he crumbled to the ground.

Running towards him I went and kicked him hard in the gut, then delivered a punch to his face hard enough to send a tooth flying. "Piece of shit! You think you can just mutate anything like it's nothing, don't you?! You fucking monster!" I yelled, continuing my onslaught on the doctor.

Monster. Animal. Psycho. Bastard. These words just barely describe what this poor excuse of humanity was. I panted once I finished, looking at the doctor, he was covered in blood, whimpering and coughing, I shook my head, "you know...you probably could've helped humanity you know, instead, your just nothing more than a fucking mad dog...guess" I pulled out my gundagger, pressing a button as it converted into the form of a pistol, an M9 to be exact, "...its time that you were put down" I finish pointing the barrel at his temple.

"Holy shit, I think he's gonna do it..." Ethan muttered as they watched with anticipation.

"Mark cool your jets!" I stopped, turning to Ben, staring me down.

"Don't try to stop me, this monster needs to die" I growled.

"Mark, I know you don't want to do this, if you do, it won't be pretty for anyone" Ben stated.

"Ben, you heard him, if we lock him up, he'll just escape, you heard him, Plumber HQ's security is fucking cardboard" I shout, "killing this guy will solve a ton of problems back on Earth" I stated.

"Mark...don't do it, you really think killing him will satisfy anyone?" Ben retorted.

"Look around you! He caused all this!" I shout gesturing to all the destruction, "You really don't think killing this son-of-a-bitch is worth it?" I snarled.

"You don't think I haven't thought of it before? Trust me, I've thought of killing the many bad guys I've fought over the years, but I realize it's never worth it, usually there is someone who wants to take over where the bad I took out, just let the Plumbers take care of him" Ben insisted.

Before I could say anything a gunshot rang out, I looked, the barrel of my gun was still cold, but I looked, seeing my brother holding out a gun of his own over where Dr. Animo was, now a bloody heap on the ground with a hole in his head.

"Sorry Ben, but that's a chance I can't take" Chris replied coldly.

"Dude!" Ben exclaimed.

"Like Mark said, Animo was going to escape again, and again, and again, killing him is better for everyone" Chris responded.

"Damn it bro!" I yelled, then shot Animo's corpse, mostly in anger but also to make sure he was dead.

"Ok now he's dead" I state then went to check on Christine.

"Well that was anti-climactic..." Ethan stated.

"Yeah but least this planet's done" Joanne shrugged.

"Tune in next time to learn what will happen to Team Terraforce next, until then I'm Josh"

"I'm Ethan"

"And I'm Joanne"

"And this is Dreadzone Z!"

* * *

><p>Blackwell meanwhile flicked off the TV, "Well, there goes that" he shrugged and then looked over the files Dr. Animo left in the station, "But his loss is my gain" he mused happily. Now that he got the information, he could create his very own army of mutations, he smiled evilly and soon pulled out a book, titled 'The Hunger Games' and began to read it.<p>

"Gotta say this book is good reading" he mused. "Maybe I should take a few pages from these guys into my sport" he grinned and soon began typing down a list of ideas on a clipboard.

* * *

><p><strong>Yeah, I just killed Dr. Animo...why do I feel like a complete jerk now? Anyway now that this is chapter is done, just wait till the next one, ok? R&amp;R for now.<strong>


	9. Return of a Friend

**And here is the next chapter everybody, hope you all enjoy it ^^ Lots of heavy stuff here**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 8: Act 1- Interlude (Return of a Friend)<strong>

I looked across from the couch, my brother beside me, Max on the other couch, staring at us, judging us, shaking his head, he sighed.

"Do you two have any idea how much trouble you both are in?" he asked us.

I shuddered and looked away, too scared to make eye contact. We got Christine to the med-bay where she was currently being treated for her injuries. We all did, after the fight with Dr. Animo, but Max called me and my brother away to talk.

I wouldn't blame him, given how we both acted.

"Max...he mutated innocent people, I know we saved them, but I don't think they were going to go easy on him" I stated earnestly.

"I know, they would've incarcerated him, but now I have to go through a lot of red tape since you both killed him, on alien soil too. It's making humanity look weak, that we can't incarcerate our own" the Hawaiian shirt man stated.

"Well given _someone_ let him escape on _their_ watch, who's fault is that?" Chris chimed in, adding empthasis on those words as he spoke.

Max growled a bit in frustration from this, "but...he does have a point Max, if you had increased security instead of just having a freaking force field, he'd never escape" I added.

"I keep telling him we gotta upgrade the security" Ben chimed in, munching on some chili fries, "want some?" he offered his bin to us. I took one and ate it, then two, then five, I was very hungry.

"Whoa there, my fries" Ben took the fries and munched on the remaining ones he had managed to save.

"Focus" Max called, "The point is, you both took the law into your own hands, even if Dr. Animo did those things, we still need to have him trialed according to the law" he once again repeated.

"Then maybe you need to do a better job at enforcing it" Chris once again taking the words right out of my mouth.

"Excuse me?!"

"You heard me, if Ben told you to upgrade security, you should've upgraded when he told you, and since Animo basically said Plumber HQ's security on Earth is shit, then more people are going to lose faith in the Plumbers, then there will be an investigation, you might get replaced by someone more competent and the security would be doubled. If I were in charge, any criminals would be caught and arrested, possibly given the death sentence, depending on how serious their crimes are. The point is now you pretty much have to upgrade since everyone knows the Plumbers on Earth are a fucking joke" Chris explained.

Again, I agreed with him. As if fueled by his speech, I decided to throw my two cents out. "Not to mention Animo was going to be released, he has connections now, Blackwell probably was going to release him on bail or sneak him out somehow, evil bad guys always have connections in government, so in a sense, killing him solved a lot of problems".

Max was about to say something, his mouth opened, but nothing came out. "He did make a point there" Ben muttered to his grandpa.

"The point is Max, sometimes you follow the law, and sometimes you gotta oppose it or take it into your own hands. Those girls, you know they asked me for an autograph earlier? They were really nice, and Animo went and turned them into monsters, I don't know about you, but there was no fucking way I was going to let him live after that, I do not care what the Plumbers think, if someone does that to innocent people, I will kill them" I stated glaring at him. I got up and then left the room, ignoring Max telling me to return and went into my room, huffing.

* * *

><p>"Let him go" Chris said as he watched his brother walk upstairs.<p>

"I get it, but he needs to understand, both of you, that taking the law into your own hands gives nothing but trouble, I'm trying to steer him away from that side of the fence" Max replied.

"Still Max, he's got a point, you're gonna need to be more strict in keeping prisoners in check from now on" Chris stated as he got comfy on the couch.

"I know..." he sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, "Mark...back there on Azara...did he go through any...problems back home?" Max asked wearingly.

"Add to the list of problems with him, uh, bullying, being picked on a lot, the family situation, parents fighting and such, and generally the way the world works...yeah that's to name a few" Chris said nonchalantly.

"Wait, bullying?" Ben piped in, suddenly interested, "How bad was it?" he asked.

"His entire school life, at first it was just harmless, he didn't know any better, but..." Chris huffed, "...as he got older...he started getting angry at people...he cursed, played violent video games, generally acted mad, he finally told me what was wrong and I told him I'd take care of it, but he insisted it'd blow over" Chris explained.

"Did it?" Ben asked, this time he was completely focused.

"I thought it did, until towards his last year did I hear him complain about his school, then I pieced it together" the older brother replied.

"He graduated thankfully, but he still suffering from the affects...I don't think he entirely forgave them, and in honesty, I wouldn't" he added.

"Wow...when I was growing up I got picked on by these two kids, Cash and JT, we used to be friends, me and JT, but he fell in with Cash, after this Techadon robot glow nearly took over Cash did we make up..." Ben looked at his fries then put them down, "I know what it's like going through that, just makes me wish I was there to help him" he said slightly sad.

"Ben..." Chris began.

"I think we can all agree to talk about this later, right now, Chris, you stay here," Max said and got up, "I have to have a little talk with Mark" he added, going upstairs.

* * *

><p>I sighed and looked at the ceiling, trying to get the argument out of my, but it just made my blood boil more. 'Damn my anger problems...' I huffed and got up, just as the door knocked.<p>

"Come in" I said, then froze seeing Max walk in. "What? Are you going to chew me out again?" I asked bitterly.

"I was going to, but after thinking it over on the way up here, I'm deciding to listen to your problems" he replied sitting on the bed.

I blinked then sat down in the desk chair, "Alright...whatcha wanna know?" I shrugged.

"Well, I was going to chew you out again for what your brother did, but I decided to talk to you first, and ask: Are you ok?"

I looked at him, my brain was trying to make me say 'yes' however, given everything that happened, I was unsure. Seeing those people on Nabrilloth, then those girls and their mutations, and finally Animo's corpse. I sighed more and looked away, "I'm not..." I answered.

"Nabrilloth...Azara...this whole fucking game show, I hate it Max, but I can't do anything but just follow orders, otherwise I die." I felt my body shaking and gulped, "Back on Nabrilloth, I saw people dying all around me, kids, men, women, old people...and I felt like it was my fault. Every time I went asleep while recovering, I kept seeing the flashes of their faces. And on Azara, those girls, those people Max, he mutated them! That's just fundamentally wrong, man..." I looked at him square in the eyes, "there was no way in hell I was going to forgive him, but..." I looked down, "when Ben talked me down, I knew, a part of me knew that he was right, if I just killed him, I'd be worse than a villain, than Animo, but I bet Blackwell is probably spinning some lie that I kill people for fun and make me out as a psycho, the sad part is, he's right...I am a psycho, even before this..." I said down again, not shedding any tears, not showing any weakness, I knew Blackwell was watching somewhere.

"Chris mentioned you got bullied a lot in school, guess it's worse than what he said?" Max asked softly.

"It was...it was hell, and no matter what I did, it got worse. I ignored them, or tried to, they just kept pushing, finding way to get me to talk to them, or my own loneliness made me talk to them. I talk to the teachers and tell them my problems, they just gave a slap to the wrist, and it got worse. Not to mention my habit for being a snitch made eighth grade a living hell. By the time graduation rolled by, I was ready to lose it, had it not been for talking out my problems to the school shrink, I might've done something horrible. Now...maybe I wish I had just fought them all off" I snarled bitterly.

"You know, Ben got bullied a lot as a kid by two kids, eventually, when he had gotten the Omnitrix he got courage. He told me when Cash attempted to bully Ben, he was going to use the Omnitrix, but he didn't and stood up to him. Sometimes you need to summon the courage to stand up to your bullies, to show they have no power over you" Max replied.

"Then Cash got augmented with alien tech, got his ass whipped by Ben then made peace, right?" I inquired.

"As of a mater of fact. yeah..."

"So sometimes violence is the best answer, I'm just glad I'm far away from Earth...I hate that place" I mutter angrily.

"I know, it's got its problems, but it's still your home, remember that" he said, putting a hand on my shoulder and started walking out.

"Max?" I called, making him stop, "Am...I a good person?" I asked in a low tone, like a child asking if he or she was in trouble.

Max didn't speak, for a minute it was just silence, then he turned to me, "You've been through a lot, but from what I can tell, you're a good kid" he responded smiling as he left. I smiled a bit, thanks Max...I needed that.

* * *

><p>"How is he?"<p>

"He's alright, bit shaken up, but I think he'll be ok, I think you better make sure he's safe, as his brother, alright son?" Max looked to Chris sternly.

"Got it"

"And look, even if Animo got what he deserved, you shouldn't kill like that, it'll make you no worse than the villain" the Plumber said.

"Kind of difficult here Max, everyone wants us dead" Chris said.

"Right, lets go check on the rest of the team, then we got to go back to Earth" Max replied, "I got some security issues I need to look through" he smirked. Chris nodded and got up to get Mark, leaving the two Tennysons alone.

"You alright grandpa?" Ben asked.

"One thing I'm worried about, Animo said that we should keep a closer eye on our recruits, and the fact he could get a message to him and help him escape...means we have moles in our system" Max replied.

"Which means we're going to sniff them out, right?" Ben asked.

"Yeah...but one thing is bugging me..." Max scratched his chin, "How did Chris know about the Plumber HQ's force field? And about how easy it was to bypass it" Max inquired.

"Maybe Blackwell got into our systems and took our files? With Blukic and Driba as Tech Support, it's possible" Ben shrugged.

"Possibly..." Max agreed, but still, he had a nagging feeling about the elder sibling as he and his brother walked to them to go visit their friends. _'Better keep an eye on him, and Blackwell'_ he thought.

* * *

><p>I looked at the bed that had Christine in it, despite being flung into a wall, bitten by a snake-mutation and possibly poisoned, she was doing well. the poison was gone and her wounds were healing rapidly.<p>

"Perks of being a supernatural creature" she smiled weakly.

"I'm just glad you're ok" I responded smiling.

"Aww, someone has a crush~" Joseph sang, earning a gut punch from me.

"Shut it!" I huffed.

"Still, thanks for the save back there" Christine replied, holding my hand and then planting a peck on my cheek as a thanks. I felt my face go red from the exchange, and I swore my friends were once again joking about this.

"Come on, she needs rest, lets go" Ben said and left.

"Can I stay a bit longer?" I asked earnestly.

Chris shrugged, "Go ahead" he left once he finished those words, leading the rest of the crew out.

I stared at Christine, "Hey...um...look...thanks..." I replied, nervous, mind going blank.

"Mark...again, thanks for everything back there, you had guts fighting off those mutations and Dr. Animo" she smiled softly and nuzzled against me, making me feel nervous.

"If I get better fast, I promise to reward you" she seductively whispered in my ear.

I felt my manhood twitch from what she said and how she said it, "reward?" I asked nervously, "W-What kind?" I inquired.

"Oh...my little secret" she winked, tail swishing back and forth.

I swear this chick was enjoying making me nervous and blushing like mad around her, which was even harder given her hospital gown tugged a bit on her...glorious chest.

"I'm gonna go" I said and got up, bolting out of the room.

"Man, it's fun teasing him" Christine giggled, then smiled, remembering the events that got her into this hospital, and how Mark saved her. _'Man, keep this up, I just might give you that reward and more'_ she thought, blushing a bit from the thought.

* * *

><p>"So what now?" Joseph asked.<p>

"Let me see that Omnitrix of yours for a sec?" Ben asked, holding out his own on his wrist.

Joseph nodded and did what he said, both Omnitrixes soon activated and the dials and holographic displays soon turned in a clock-wise formation before stopping.

**ALIEN DNA CATALOG UPDATED, SUCESSFUL TRANSFER**

"What did they just do?!" Joseph exclaimed.

"I believe I can explain that" a voice said, soon the two saw someone teleport in, that someone was Azmuth, who looked at both males, "Azmuth, what are you doing here?" Ben asked.

"About to take back the Omnitrix that Joseph here had taken, had I not found a note explaining why it was stolen" the Galvan replied and jumped on Joseph's shoulder, inspecting his work. "Honestly, I create a back-up incase Benjamin tampered or destroyed the one he had, and suddenly I find it gone, and all that was there was a note explaining it was taken for important purposes" he huffed.

"Uh...who are you?" Joseph inquired, watching the frog tamper with the Omnitrix.

"This is Azmuth, creator of the Omnitrix and smartest Galvan in three-"

"Five"

"Right...Five galaxies" Ben corrected himself.

"Wait, so this frog made the Omnitrix?" Zach asked, confused by how someone so small made the very machines his friend and Ben had on their person.

"Yes, and I am a Galvan first and foremost" Azmuth stated, "I made the Omnitrix to help other species better understand each other, to put them a mile in each other shoes. Ben found and uses it to be a hero, a tool for peace, for that I am grateful. I created a second one however, incase Ben were to destroy his with the way he acts, however I wanted to make this one inconspicuous, and added a few features that helped its user. I locked it away for safe keeping, however, I only recently learned it was stolen, when I reached the vault, I found a note from an...old friend shall we say, who needed it" he explained.

"Let me guess, it's someone who's like you?" Ben crossed his arms.

"Of a sort, but if he needed to use it, I trust him. But as for you young man" he turned to look at Joseph, "I trust you will use this wisely?" he inquired.

"Of course" Joseph replied, straightening up.

"Good, and Max, ensure that Ben does not destroy his Omnitrix," the Galvan scientist replied.

"Understood" Max replied.

Azmuth nodded, then saw Mark enter the room, "Hmm..." he jumped over and looked at Mark, "you...you bear a striking resemblance to someone I know..." he responded.

"Uh...thanks?" Mark replied nervously, "I know who you are, I overheard you guys talking" Mark responded.

"good that saves me the trouble, I trust you will make sure Joseph doesn't abuse the Omnitrix?"

"I will, don't worry"

"Good, now then, I must go now, I am behind schedule as is, Max, want me to drop you off?" Azmuth inquired.

"Sure, guess we'll be seeing you all soon" Max looked at each of us.

"Ok…good luck sir" I saluted to him, as did we all.

"For what it's worth, you kids would make great Plumbers one day, I might be able to get some applications for you guys once you get out, and full pardons for the stuff you've done" Max smiled a bit at that.

"Anyway, better go, Max out," the trio soon vanished in a beam of light and we all looked at each other.

"Well…guess we chill before the big fight" I shrugged and got rid of my armor, rolling my shoulders so I could get some blood flowing through them.

"Dude, you've been working out" Joseph stated as he looked at me, noticing I had gotten some muscle going on.

"Yeah…so?" I asked as I looked at myself in a mirror.

"Maybe being in the armor got him stronger," Ethan said as he came over to us.

_'__Or those late night training sessions with Luna are paying off,'_ I thought. I then remembered about John and him being in a coma and went to go see him. I stood there before the infirmary door and sighed, then walked in…

I was stunned…

The reason why was because I saw John there, sitting on the bed, eating food and watching TV.

"Hey, saw your fight with Animo, nice work Mark," John said smiling.

"Dude! You're awake!" I said happily. The others were also happy to see him awake and the next few moments were of each of us explaining what happened to bring John up to speed.

"Man, I missed out on all the cool stuff!" john whined.

"Never mind that, how and when did you wake up?" Zach asked.

"Dunno, for some reason I woke up, strangest thing though, I thought I saw a man when I woke up, I think he said 'it's not your time to die yet' then vanished" John explained.

A man huh? Why do I get the feeling that this sounded way too similar to what happened with me on Anur Ormerow?

"I wonder…" I muttered. Just then the door opened and a robot with a hovering lower body came in with a big box in his hands.

"Someone left this for you in the main room, doesn't have a sender, it just says 'use these to defeat your enemies' I think you guys got a fan or something," the robot said as he opened the box. We looked inside the box and gaped at what was inside. We saw so much tech and they were all weapons too! We each took some weapons from the box, each to fit our own needs too.

Chris looked at the large twin gun-swords he got, Zach with the rocket launcher and the Dual Raptors. John and David with their gauntlets and wrenches, even Joseph got a huge buster sword and Frankie with a staff. I looked in the box and saw some chips, each in different colors and another note.

"These chips will help power your weapons, use them against your enemies for a bigger boost, the large chips are Omega mods that can used to empower your weapons with things like Acid, Freeze, Shock, etc. The Alpha mods can increase things like damage, ammo, etc." I read aloud, looking behind it for a sender, but there was no one. We looked at the chips in the box and I picked the three Omega chips we got. Well there was a picture with a flame on it, another with an icicle, and the last with an acid picture.

So a few minutes later the dual Vipers got an Acid mod upgrade, the Holoshield Launcher was installed with the Freeze chip, the B-6 Obliterator got a magma chip in it, and each of our personal weapons got some upgrades with the Alpha mods and Omega mods.

"Man this is awesome!" Zach said as he twirled his Dual Vipers.

"Yeah!" John said as he smashed his fists together and they ignited. I smiled, then looked into the box one more time, that's what I saw something small and pulled it out. I looked at it and saw it was small and square; I opened my hand and saw it was a small music box.

"Huh, what's this?" I wondered as I opened it. The music box started to play a rather lovely tune…which was strange because it felt like I knew this from somewhere.

"Wow…kinda weird that whoever got us there gave this too," Joseph said as the gang listened. I then saw a piece of paper in the box and took it, unfolding it and looked at it.

_Whenever you need to calm down, or to put the beast inside you to sleep, play this music box…_

I looked at the note and shut the music box, now heading to my room to chew this all over while everyone was busy with their new toys. Who helped John? Was it the guy who I thought saved me on Anur Ormerow? And who sent us these weapons and the music box? I sat on my bed's edge as I listened to the music box I put on my bedside counter, trying to figure all this out.

God today was just one revelation after another.

"Lovely tune isn't it?" Luna asked as she walked in and sat down next to me.

"Yeah…" I replied, still focused on the tune.

"You okay?" Luna asked softly.

"No…I'm confused…" I told her.

"Talk to me…" Luna said softly. I sighed and told her what I was thinking right then as she listened.

"Hmm…you have a deep mind…" Luna said.

"Yeah…" I said as I lay down on the bed, staring at the ceiling.

"By the way, back on Azara…I heard what you said to Animo, gotta say, you were pretty ballsy, and brave...or stupid" Luna said with a smirk. I blushed from that and turned to not face her.

"You heard that?" I asked her.

"Yep, and I wanted to thank you for saving Christine back there" Luna said and nuzzled her face next to mine. I was red now but I tried not to show it, if Luna saw then she'd never let it go. Then again if any of the others saw this I'd never hear the end of it.

"Hey…can I join your team?" she asked me suddenly.

"Uh…why?" I asked her suspiciously.

"Well since we've met each other and I've helped you out, maybe I could join your group as a way to pay off the debt?" Luna asked.

"Well, I'll have to ask the guys…but sure…" I said. Luna replied by licking my cheek like a dog and made herself comfortable in my bed.

"Then I guess I'll sleep here then,"

"What?!" I shouted in disbelief with a shocked look on my face, that and the fact I was blushing like crazy for her statement.

"Well this bed is comfy, and I thought you could use the company, plus Christine wouldn't stop talking about you so I think adding her will help us both out" Luna said. I sighed, defeated, blushing a bit but thankful she didn't see it.

"Uh…so maybe we should get back to the others?" I inquired, trying to change the subject.

"Yeah, in case they get curious and find us like this," Luna said. I nodded and we went out of my room to the others, who were wondering what we were doing.

"Just chatting, oh and also anyone mind if Luna joined the team?" I asked them. They all agreed to letting her join and I smiled a bit since we had both our old friend back, as well as two new ones.

This was turning out well for us.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Alistair was busy building some of the robots using some custom made schematics and adding the parts to them when an assistant robot entered the Machine room.<p>

"Sir, ratings are in, Team Terraforce is starting to take the lead in most polls, and in individual polls they team members are starting to rise up too," the robot said.

"Huh, I should do this more often, and what from our spy?" Alistair asked.

"He's working on getting some info, but apparently Team Twin Claw just joined Team Terraforce," the robot said.

"Interesting…anything else?" he asked.

"John, that boy who was put into a coma by Shellshock, woke up," the assistant said.

"Good, a little more excitement is always good, and the status of my new toy?" Alistair asked.

"It is going slowly, but its progressing well sir, as are the other prototype robots," the robot said.

"And…_him_?" Alistair asked.

"He had his limbs replaced and is currently waiting to be reactivated sir, as you ordered," the robot said.

"Good…once he is operational let's send him out on a little field test," Alistair said and added the last part to the robot. He pushed a button on his mechanical arm and the robot soldier jittered a few times before its eyes lit up.

"Excellent!" Alistair proclaimed.

Once more he got a beeping sound from tablet and ushered the robot out, letting him take the message alone.

**The Doctor has checked out, I assume you're taking over?**

_Yes, his research is going to be invaluable to my machines and my show_

**I hope you realize the risk you took was huge, had he not died like he did, he could've revealed everything**

_Then its a good thing he's dead, right?_

**That is it, but from now on tell your operatives to remain on alert and be careful, Max is suspicious, and going to upgrade the HQ's security from now on.**

_Understood, you better be too, I'm not letting you off the hook for that screw up, now you're going to get me every bit of intel you got on the Plumbers secrets._

**Don't worry, I know a guy who has the intel, ever heard of someone called "The Huntsmen"?**

* * *

><p><strong>Well that episode was heavy, but its one, also been thinking about an idea for achievements, to show if this were like a game, what would you get? Well here's the achievements:<strong>

**The Doctor is in (Silver)- **Defeated Dr. Animo, or rather beat his mutants then have Chris shoot him...eh, he's dead, who cares?

**Mutation Situation (Bronze)-** Completed Azara, congrats you got rid of a mad scientist and saved a bunch of innocent people, don't you feel proud?

**Total Meltdown (Bronze)-** Completed Nabrilloth, though seems like they're gonna be needing to get ships as well, moving day!

**Zombie Dance Party (Bronze)**- Completed Anur Ormerow, we need to stop using zombies in everything

**Congratulations, you are...Adequate (Bronze)**- Complete the Qualifying Round, congrats you've proven that Earth can survive an arena, now for the main course.

**Our story Begins (Bronze)-** Completed the tutorial, let's see if these kids will survive Dreadzone? My money is they won't.

**I'll be updating these achievements as we go, making these all up as we go too, just figured it'd be funny.**


	10. Just like old times

**Well here we are, the chapter we've all been wanting to see, anyone excited to finally see Team Terraforce fight Shellshock?**

***there is no one in the audience***

**...I need to get more reviewers here...anyway here's the chapter you want.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 9: Act 1- Avenger Tournament (Just like old times)<strong>

An alarm blared in my room as I went to turn it off, my god I hate mornings…I turned and saw Luna sleeping in the bed and smiled, she looked cute when she was asleep. Oh god I feel like a pervert or a stalker...ok I need to get up, I went to the bathroom and took a nice shower, which was a good way to start the day actually, what with us about to fight Shellshock later. I got out, dried off and put some clothes on, then brushed my teeth and got out of the bathroom.

"Shower's all yours Luna," I told her as she got up and stretched like my dog, Angel, did in the morning.

"Okay," she yawned and went in. I went downstairs to the others and found Joseph working on something.

"I take it you never get any sleep huh?" I asked and sat down next to him, trying to see what he was making.

"Not really, so sleep well?" he asked, still tinkering with his...whatever it was.

"Yeah, I did, you?"

"Alright I guess, decided to tinker on a few things while I was awake…been down here for…" Joseph checked his watch, "three hours…I think"

"You were down here for three hours? Dude you need some rest" I stated with one of my trademark smirks.

"Yeah, Yeah, so you talk to your folks yet?" he asked.

Truth be honest, I didn't, or couldn't for fear of Blackwell listening in on my conversations, still…even if I could, I don't know what to talk about, like 'oh hey grandpa, I'm ok, and how is everyone and what happened to my mom?' yeah…it didn't work out that well in my head. Plus, I couldn't figure out anything to say to him, I didn't want to hear any bad news of my folks.

"Not really…" I admitted shyly.

"You might wanna, never know when you can talk to them or when it'll be your last chance" he said in a sagely tone.

"Who are you, my dad?" I asked, lightly punching his shoulder.

We both laughed until the gang came down, well Luna and a few others, my bro was probably still sleeping…lazy shmuck…

"Come on we better go eat" I said, getting up, "my belly is hungry" I grinned and rubbed my belly to reiterate as it growled loudly.

"No duh," most of us said as we went to the mess hall. We managed to beat the traffic and got a large enough table for us and ate before the other contestants came in…well some, most were killed and a few looked like fresh recruits, those poor fools, we were here for a week, or was it months? Ah well, the point was we're here and already I miss our home Earth…yet I wondered if anyone would miss us, especially after what my brother did to Animo…doubt it.

"Oi, Mark, you there?" Joseph asked as he snapped his fingers in my face.

"Huh?" I snapped back to reality when he did that.

"Dude, you've been zoning out since Azara, what's going on in that head of yours…on second thought don't answer that," Joseph stated as he took a bite of his pancakes.

"If you were Will and you said that, I'd kill you," I said modestly but bluntly.

"…You know, usually I'd be okay with that since you'd be kidding…but now I'm concerned if you're kidding or being serious," he said.

"Funny, I thought the same thing too…wonder how everyone on Earth is taking on what happened to Harangue?" I wondered aloud.

"Well I checked online and turns out Dr. Animo's body was taken back to Earth, was going to be given a funeral but the body mysteriously vanished the day before the funeral, and also NASA made contact with those guys from Nabrillloth and negotiations are being made…with the Plumbers acting as security," Frankie said from reading a holotablet.

"Wow...we're missing out…" I muttered.

"Wait Animo's body vanished?" Joseph asked, "great...ten bucks says that psycho is gonna come back a zombie" I spat out bitterly, drinking my iced tea down to help swallow my pancakes.

"Or someone is gonna burn the body" Joseph suggested as he finished his breakfast.

"Here's hoping," I reply and finished my breakfast as well. We headed back to the suite in time to get word on the challenge called the "Tower of Power" where we had to fight out way up the large tower in the stadium and face waves of enemies, then fight Shellshock.

"Man, this is gonna be so fun," I grinned as the shuttle came in.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Alistair was busy with the Avenger Tournament when he got an email. He opened it and a black box appeared, then soon some white text appeared:<p>

_He is ready…_

Alistair looked at the message and looked at the mechanical arm he had on and pressed some buttons on it. The holographic image of a robot appeared as it saluted.

"Orders sir?" it asked.

"Release _him_…I wanna test him out a bit," Alistair said as he lay back in his chair. The robot nodded and the hologram faded. Alistair turned his chair to the Battledome as the shuttle landed and Team Terraforce came onto the stage. He pressed a button and a camera bot came in, ready to record.

* * *

><p><em>Mark's POV<em>

We stepped off the shuttle and saw the rest of the team assembled in a floating observer platform. We could only take three people with us, it was me, Joseph and John again, but we were eligible to switch out whenever we wanted during the fight.

"Well it looks like the humans actually managed to get this far," Josh commented as he and the other two looked at us from their podium.

"Surprised?" I asked him aloud.

"Nah, but I'm down a few credits now," Josh mumbled.

"Heh, wait I thought bolts were the currency here?" Joanne asked looking at her announcer.

"Alistair recently changed it to allow credits and also added a cash conversion machine for it," Ethan explained looking down at them.

"Finally! Been waiting for that for a while…" John stated, almost eagerly.

"You just woke up dude…calm down" I told him.

"Focus you two!" Joseph stated.

"Sorry,"

"Hold up folks, it looks like the big man himself has an important announcement to Team Terraforce," Josh said as a Holovision appeared in front of us. We saw the image of Alistair appear on the monitor with his hands folded together.

"I must say I'm impressed in you humans…well some humans…" Alistair remarked to us, I flipped him the bird, but he just smirked and chuckled, amused by my attempt to make him angry. "I have a proposition for you, I just recently acquired a new…how should I put this? …_Investment_ from some friends and I wished to test it out here once you reach the top of the Tower of Power, if you manage to last enough time against it, alongside Shellshock, you shall win not only the Avenger armor and a medal for the next round, but also this!" Alistair said and the screen changed to show a beach resort on a planet. The planet was itself an island looking planet, and one of the screens was of a beautiful resort you'd see in those commercials advertising it.

"The beautiful resort planet of Capo Luna, should you win this you and your team will be entitled for a week of relaxation, along with vaccinations if you got anything during your stay here. But you will still wear the collar," Alistair said to us as we saw pictures of the landscape of Capo Luna. the resorts, the beautiful sandy beaches, the smoking hot alien chicks (and dudes for the ladies) at the resort, hell it was something like those beach scenes you'd see in anime or real life.

Ok normally I would never buy for this, but hey, if he's actually serious, then we can at least enjoy a good week away from this nightmare, plus, Luna in a bikini was something I did not wanna miss out on seeing.

"We're in!" we all said unanimously.

"Good, now, onto the challenge!" Alistair declared as the Holovision showed a large platform rising from the floor with smaller towers rising up and other stuff rising with it.

"Holy…" I muttered.

"Let's go!" John said and charged ahead of us.

"Wait up!" Joseph said as he ran after him. I looked at the monitor, noticing someone standing there….hang on…

"Jack of blades?" I wondered aloud with confusion. The figure was hard to see clearly but it had the figure of Jack of Blades from Fable 1. It disappeared, and then when I heard my collar beeping, I was suddenly teleported to the guys.

"Guys, did you see that guy on the monitor?" I asked them.

"Who?" Joseph asked.

"This might sound crazy…but it was Jack of Blades from Fable 1," I told them.

"Isn't he dead?" John asked.

"Yeah…it looked kinda like him…maybe I'm losing it…" I muttered.

"As If you had anything!" someone called from the audience.

"You really want to mess with a guy who can kill?"

"…Never mind,"

"Thank you!"

"Still…I wonder…maybe that's who we gotta fight?" John asked. A bunch of robots firing at us stopped us from thinking as I got ready to fight. John got his Fusion rifle and fired some headshots at the robots.

"Right….now how the hell are we gonna get up there?" I wondered as we looked at the pedestals.

"Hmm…" Joseph thought as he tapped his foot on the ground. Suddenly he got an idea and soon smirked, "Jetray!" he called, the green light enveloping and shifting him as he soon transformed into his Jetray form, flying around and shooting the robots with his lasers. After a few minutes of him flying around and shooting up the robot he soon was on the other pedestal, landing on a switch that allowed a laser floor to come online.

"Thanks!" I call as we made our way up. Suddenly the floor started flickering and we realized it wouldn't hold, so we ran as fast as we could, but due to some…asthma problem or exhaustion, whatever it was, I panted for breath and when the floor gave way I barely managed to grab the ledge.

"How'd that happen? "Ethan asked.

"Beats me," Joanne said as she hid the controls for the laser floors from the other two men.

"That was close, good thing Mark grabbed the ledge, otherwise he'd be burned and cooked in that acid below, and we've seen some good competitors lose their lives that way huh Joanne?" Josh asked her.

"Yes, yes, I did like that one man who got burnt into toast…he sure was tasty," Joanne grinned.

The two males scooted away from her and watched the fighting. Right now we were on our way to the top of the tower, which was easier said than done due to "failures" in the system, so we got laser bridge malfunctioning, flying robots that tried to shoot us up, and one thing I remember was dodging spinning blades and artificial lightning…they really went all out with this stuff huh?

Had Joseph not had the Omnitrix, we'd be toast, but with it he was able to help us a lot...until a stray lightning bolt shocked him back to normal. When he attempted to use it again, shouting 'Big Chill' out loud, nothing happened.

**OMNITRIX MALFUNCTION DETECTED, DNA TRANSFORMATION TEMPORARILY UNAVAILABLE**

"Oh are you shitting me?!" Joseph called out in frustration.

"Calm down!" I yelled, "look we're right there..." I gestured to the top of the tower, as if it was a gift from God.

After getting zapped, barbequed, shot at, and nearly roasted alive, we made it to the top…and fell to the floor in charred smoking heaps of metal and flesh.

"They…they must love this…" I moaned.

"My butt…it hurts…" Joseph said.

"Pain…" John replied.

"Huh, I thought they'd be dead by now…" Joanne said as the commentators looked at the team while eating wings.

"Never underestimate a human," Ethan stated with a grin on his face as he ate another wing.

We got up, cracking our backs as we did, then saw who was in front of us. I guess I was right about me seeing Jack of Blades, because that was who we saw standing before us right now. It was the same Jack of Blades from fable 1…well actually he looked like him, but with different colors…and he didn't have the masks on his belt and his armor looked more high-tech like ours compared to the Jack's leather armor, and he had a dagger-tail thing on his left arm and only one mask on his face with two red lines going down the eye-sockets, it looked like bloody tears actually, not to mention the dark blue, almost black cloak he had on his shoulder was much longer and more ragged and torn than the original's, now I was confused…was this the same Jack of Blades? Or was it someone posing as him.

"Jack of Blades?" Joseph and John both asked at the same time.

**"****No, something worse than him…"** he said in a techno-organic voice and got up to look at us. I noticed he seemed to be around our age and his voice sounded…familiar…but…where did I hear that voice before?

**"****I look like Jack of Blades…yet at the same time I am not him," **the man said.

"Then…who are you?" I asked him but already I was making various plans how to fight him and who he was. His head turned to me and I thought he was smirking under that mask.

**"****You're opponent…"** he said as he was suddenly standing right in front of my face. I managed to dodge in time to miss his dagger-tail about to stab me, but soon a crack on my visor showed just how close I was to death.

"Holy crap folks, did anyone see that?!" Josh said as he was on the edge of his seat watching what happened.

"I didn't even see him move!" Joanne stated.

"What is this guy?" Ethan mumbled.

I managed to dodge some attack as John and Joseph tried to attack Jack of Blades or whatever he was. He charged at us and we dodged, there was something weird with his move, they were fluid, emotionless, void of anything, only wanting to kill. A sliver of blood from a cut on my cheek reminded me of what I was facing and I soon attacked him.

He dodged my attack and his dagger-tail whipped close to my neck, ready to slice it. Thankfully I stopped in my tracks to barely manage to see it slip by, then attacked him while his back was turned. He turned slightly in my direction as his dagger-tail lashed in the air. Although the attack cut my arm pretty bad, I managed to use my left arm to shoot a bullet at the masked man's face.

The masked man stumbled to the ground as the mask flew off near him. I held my hand to stop the bleeding as best as I could, but then stopped and looked at the scar. I saw that it was suddenly being healed using high-speed regeneration; soon it was back to normal. I looked at the arm then to Jack as Joseph and John stood over him. There was…some black crap coming out of the area I shot him, it looked kinda like oil.

"Looks kinda like oil…" John muttered.

_"__No fucking shit Sherlock…'_ I thought mentally as I turned Jack's head to the side. Instantly I felt something tear my shoulder and saw the dagger-tail embedded into my left shoulder. I yelled in pain and held my bleeding shoulder as Jack stood before me. One of his eyes was glowing red from under the hood…wait a minute…

"Conner?" I asked in stunned shock. the man let his hood fall down and it was indeed Conner…only…different, I had expected to see some scratches or nothing at all, as it was said he got vaporized, yet here he was, but though he bore the face of my former friend, before me was something entirely different. His left eye was mechanical, glowing red, not to mention he had some scars on that side of his face, and a bullet hole where I shot him. Plus his hair was much blonder than before more leaning towards platinum blonde or white, and he really looked all torn up, even had that empty soulless look in his eyes like a zombie.

Was...this really my friend?

"Damn...what happened to you?" Joseph asked him, still holding his shoulder but still shocked.

**"****Nabrillloth…you and the others abandoned me to die there, were it not for someone who happened to find me, battered and in pieces, I would've died…"** Conner said as a flashback occurred.

* * *

><p><strong>Flashback<strong>

_Conner looked weakly as his vision faded and refocused, he watches his friends get onboard a medical shuttle, no one even noticing him as they all passed him to worry about other injured and now felt angry. Did they leave him behind? He soon saw someone coming towards him and he blacked out before seeing the faded image of a male figure, the only thing he saw was a pair of red eyes._

_When Conner woke up next, he was in an unfamiliar area, it was all dark and there were sounds of gears grinding and steam puffed out of pipes. Conner realized he was on an operating table and looked around, he saw faint images of people in the darkness, glowing eyes staring at Conner. He heard something large coming towards the table and looked to see bright red eyes gleaming at him._

_"__You're awake…good…" the voice said. "My associate found you barely alive…how do you feel now? Sad? Angry? Betrayed?" the voice asked again calmly. Conner tried to speak but couldn't, so he nodded. _

_"__Would you like another chance…to get vengeance on the people who did this to you?" it asked. Conner nodded as the figure lifted its head to a control panel. "Close your eyes…this will all be over soon…" was the last things it said before he slept. _

_"Doctor, you may proceed" was the last thing he heard before the darkness enclosed him._

**End Flashback**

* * *

><p><strong>"<strong>**That was how I got this…new body…and my hatred for you…and for the people who abandoned me…"** Conner told us, looking from his arm to us again.

"That's it huh? Join the club…I got enough heat on me as is…" I muttered.

**"****Tch, you don't even realize what's going on do you?"** Conner asked me.

"No but I bet you'll tell us" I smirked.

**"Stupid mark, never changing, always so...stubborn...letting people get to you, letting your demons grow in power over the eyars...I wonder how long you can keep it up before it destroys you?"** Conner inquired.

"Hey least I'm not going emo over the fact you got blown to bits by Shellshock!" I shouted at him.

**"Because of you! It's your fault I became this!"**

"How is it my fault? you were the one who snuck onboard in the first place, dumbass!"

"He's got a point, you only have to blame yourself, instead you're just blaming Mark like we usually do" Joseph pointed out.

**"So? he's always been our butt monkey, that'll never change and neither will he...well not until I kill him"** Conner spoke with a grin.

I hated that, memories bubbled to the surface, but I forced them all down and focused solely on Conner. He was lost, now I guess its time I finished this.

"Well...there's one thing that will change" Joseph spoke and glanced at me. Conner just cocked an eyebrow at us, but I smirked.

"Yeah…me kicking Conner's ass!" I yelled and fired at Conner. Conner just stepped to the side and slammed his foot on my wounded shoulder. I couldn't help but yell in pain from that and I swear I thought I heard a bone crack.

**"****Man…this is just too easy…"** Conner said smugly. A gunshot from John caused him to let his foot off my shoulder and turned to them. Soon as he did I was surrounded in a bright gold light and suddenly was in the stand with my other team mates, clutching my broken shoulder in pain.

"You ok?" Luna's voice asked me through the pain.

"Y-yeah, never b-better," I winced from the pain from my shoulder.

"Want me to go down and teach him a lesson?" she asked as Frankie helped me up.

"Uh…no actually…look," I said and pointed a finger to the battle.

**"****Huh, that was rather easy…" **Conner said as Joseph and John were on their knees, scratched from the dagger tail. **"****I'd play with you two some more, but I'm kinda bored right now…"** Conner said as he went to pick up his mask, then stalled and coughed a bit, some blood coming out of his mouth.

**"****Damn…over-exerted myself…" **Conner grumbled as he wiped off the blood from the corner of his mouth. **"****Looks like I'll have to leave, but don't worry, we'll see each other real soon…"** Conner picked up his mask as he said this and grinned at us, the camera showing his grinning face as well as his mechanical left eye glowed brightly. **"…****Besides, with what's about to go down, we're gonna be seeing each other a lot, won't we?" **he asked as his shadow suddenly started to circle around him, tendrils appearing and wrapping themselves around him and soon he was gone.

No one spoke after that, which was good, since I felt a burning sensation on my shoulder and saw that it was all fixed, good thing no one saw. Wait, since when could my wounds heal that fast?

"Well…that was….disturbing…" Josh said first.

"Yeah…but looks like Team Terraforce is going to fight Shellshock now!" Joanne said to pick up the mood. Soon everyone was cheering again as Joseph, John, and I, were soon transported to the next arena for our little "date" with Shellshock.

* * *

><p>Conner soon emerged from the shadows and rolled his shoulder, coughing as he soon found an operating table and laid down on it, looking up at the surgical equipment looming over him.<p>

"So...how'd the battle go?" a voice called from the other room.

**"Good, I...had to leave early...though"** Conner spat bitterly.

"Got you ass whipped?"

**"Fuck no! I would've kicked their asses if you didn't do such a shitty job at repairing me"** Conner spat to the voice.

"Hey, you were just hunks of meat when Blackwell wheeled you in, I had to really splice you up with metal so sorry if you're still clunky. I told him it would take some time for you to be done completely, but Blackwell wanted you to have a field test" the voice spoke however this time louder as footsteps were heard.

**"Just patch me up doc..."** Conner spat as he put some blindfold over his eyes.

"As you command...miserable little shit" the voice spoke as the whirling of machine and the screams from Conner's mouth were heard echoing through the halls.

* * *

><p><strong>Well, was anyone expecting Conner? well I added him for a lot of reasons, which you will learn soon enough. anyway tune in next time for the fight between Team Terraforce and Shellshock. Until then, R&amp;R please!<strong>


	11. Revenge

**And here I am, back from the dead! Sorry for the late, procrastination, getting my new Xbox 360 in time for Dragon age Inquisition (which by the way I am gonna play religiously) and a whole lot of other stuff happened. Anyway here's the long awaited fight between our favorite group and the homicidal seargent robot psychopath.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 10: Act 1- Team Terraforce vs. Shellshock (Revenge)<strong>

The three of us soon stood before a large platform that had the same lava around us and another platform on the other side of the river of lava. Looking around there was no way to reach the second platform, nor any way to escape the lava...or was it acid?

They have the same color so its difficult to tell for me ok?

"Now here's the match you've all been waiting for folks! Team Terraforce against Shellshock! Humans vs. machine, squishes vs. a robot soldier with a processing unit of a coffee machine. But enough with this rambling, here comes Team Terraforce!" Josh announced as we entered the arena. We entered the arena as the crowd cheered, mainly for our demise.

"Man…tough crowd eh?" I grinned nervously.

"Eh…" Joseph just shrugged.

"And now…the moment you've all been waiting for…Joanne especially, "Josh grinned at that last comment as he continued in the deep announcer voice. "He was there during the Obani Wars, he was there when he was on the original Dreadzone, and now he's back! He's bigger, he's badder, and he's packed with even more explosive firepower than ever! I bring you: SHEEELLLSHOOOOOOCK!" Josh announced loudly as fireworks appeared and Shellshock appeared on a podium, armed with his gun and Harbinger on his back. Now the crowd went wild at the sight of him, I was even sure one or two yelled "Kill the humans!" man, how many people want me dead?!

"Heh, looks like I should've taken you boys down on Nabrillloth, but Fenrir wouldn't let me…Ah well, now I get to rip you three to shreds!" Shellshock said and pointed his gun at us.

"Your mother must be so proud…" I muttered, using two fingers to push the gun away.

"You think you're smug little man? That doctor was the same and he got killed from that," Shellshock smirked. "though least I didn't need my brother to kill one guy" he added.

I tried ignoring the "oooooh"s from the crowd from Shellshock's burn, I felt my anger grow and soon went off, "Hey! I would've fucking killed that psycho had Ben not stepped in. You really fucking think anyone was gonna let him live after the shit he pulled? Chris did him a favor, he as already dead when I got my hands on him, but, what about you? Last I heard you got turned to scrap by something called a Lombax" I retorted.

Now the crowd was jeering at Shellshock, who huffed and clocked his rifle.

"That cat got lucky! This time there's no one to help you! I'm a'gonna turn you all into chunks, then drink them in a smoothie and use your bones as a weapon rack!" he shouted.

"Heh seems someone's gotten mad, come on tin-man, I'm gonna scrap you and turn you into a fancy coffee maker!," I told Shellshock, pointing one of my guns at him.

"This kid is freaking insane...I like him already" Joanne grinned.

"You like any guy who is sadistic as you" Josh piped in.

* * *

><p><strong>Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance OST- "Hot Wind Blowing"<strong>

* * *

><p>*"Ha! A man who gets to the point, alright then! Now I get to blast you all into tiny pieces all over again!" Shellshock roared. We all dodged Shellshock as he fired at us, I jumped from a bullet whizzing past me, then jumped again and shot my gun-daggers at the robot. Shellshock shot back and some bullets flew past both our heads.<p>

John shot his Fusion rifle at Shellshock, the robot barely managing to dodge it. Joseph then appeared as Four-Arms and slashed his buster sword at him with one of his pairs of arms. Shellshock grabbed it with his free hand and dodged another bullet. "Is that the best you all got?" he asked them.

"No, but this is!" I yelled from atop him. I saw Shellshock look up as I prepared to drop my sword on his head. Shellshock quickly used his rockets to dodge the attack and fired at me. Thankfully due to Luna's training where she'd throw stuff at me, I dodged the blasts and ran to Shellshock. He shot his Harbinger at me, but thankfully I saw it coming, as did the others, and they got out of the laser blasts.

I skidded into Shellshock and attempted to slash with my daggers, but I got caught in his grip, "Heheh" he chuckled evily, then slammed me on the ground. The pain wracked my body when I was in the air, trying to recover from the blow, but that didn't pale to the metal fist that slammed into me, hit the ground and made a small crater on impact. The visor shattered and I coughed blood, yelling in pain.

"Sshhh, ouch that's gotta hurt" Josh winced from the spectacle.

I grunted and gagged more blood before getting kicked to the curb by the robot. I wheezed and tried getting up, but the punch, I think he broke some bones in my body, plus the fact I got injured by Conner earlier I think it's affecting me too, maybe I'm internally bleeding too...damn I'm a mess.

I felt John grab me and hoist me up, remind me to thank him later. I looked up, seeing Joseph as Four-Arms was currently fighting off the robot with his bare hands and sword. Using his strength to slash up the gun in his hands, causing it to break into two and clatter onto the ground.

"There we go, one less weapon to use" Joseph smiled victoriously, only to have the barrel of the Harbinger pointed dead in his face.

"Oh cluck..." he spoke before said harbinger fired and caused a huge explosion, a object flew out and landed in the stands, before a green light appeared and Joseph was soon laid out on the crushed bleachers.

"Is that all you kids have? I had thought you'd all be giving me a good show, bah, I should've destroyed you just like that city on Nabrilloth!" he shouted.

Collective gasps rang through the crowd, apparently anyone who listened to Blackwell's lies now realized who the culprit was for destroying most of Nabrilloth City. Shellshock looked at his gun but grunted, clutching his eye as it sparked and sputtered, his vision starting to static.

"You little punks! you destroyed my visor!" he yelled and soon started firing wildly. the rockets soared and whined as they started to impact and exploding everywhere, the rafters, the lights, the stands full of people, even the commentator's stand.

"Shit! Shellshock's gone mad! everyone run!" John yelled as he hung for dear life, the explosions shaking the stand and nearly made Ethan fall off, barely kept on by his chair.

The spectators were screaming all around, some already dead, blown to bits by the explosions from the rockets. I felt my body get transported to the temporary medical pit as a robot was busy patching up my wounds, while I watched Christine and Luna jump into the fray.

The two women nodded to each other and Christine jumped up, managing to kick a missile from its course and sending it flying, causing it to explode. She did the same to another, causing it to impact onto another missile and causing it to explode together, and soon a chain reaction occurred as missiles nearest to the cloud exploded simultaneously.

Luna meanwhile was busy getting as many civilians away from the action, "This way! This way! she shouted over the explosions.

Those two, one a beacon to the lost, the helpless and scared; The other a warrior goddess, her battlefield was her temple, her audience her followers. Can I really compare to these two?

Do I really have a chance with either of them?

I felt the last stitch fix my armor, seeing my health meter rise again to safe levels before I got sent back into the fray, in the middle of the smoke and lava.

The smoke made it hard to see, but considering Shellshock being a robot, he knew where we were and fired shots at us from the smoke. I barely managed to dodge some of them, one or two hitting my body, causing it to burn. Damn, it hurt like hell…I soon noticed where the shots were firing and fired back at where they originated. I felt my gun clatter and more blood pour from my wounds, even if these were plasma bullets or bolts, it felt like physical bullets were lodged in my body.

Once the smoke cleared out I saw Shellshock with some holes in him, from my shots probably, then I saw the others and they had burn marks on their armor, apparently from Shellshock or me, hard to tell. We all look at each other, a slow minute passed as we looked as one another…just…staring…I glanced at Joseph and nudged to the ring Omnitrix on his finger. Joseph, having managed to climb down to the arena, with the help of a metal claw designed to grab and put the combatants that fall out into the stands, panted and looked at me, then his ring. John looked back, but he nodded too, knowing the play.

Shellshock roared and soon began firing again, the missiles veered off course, hitting the platform around us before more laser blasts appeared, showing many DZ-Z Strikers and bladed balls appeared and fired. I kept shooting the robots, despite the injuries I suffered, the armor managed to help get rid of the shock from the shooting. I saw fire blast out from the sky, seeing a red flaming alien made of fire shooting fire blasts, melting the robots to gunk.

shellshock growled, then fired more missiles at the Pyronite, who shot them down. His eyes flashed, flickering and jittering, to John, who was busy fighting off the robots single-handedly. No way was he going to let this monkey upstage him, Shellshock charged and crashed into John, blindsiding him and causing him to skid, a metal fist to the gut caused him to gag. To finally finish it off, he pulled off his famous '180 Tomahawk finishing move', crashing the Harbinger's barrel to John's face, smashing his visor and sending his helmet fly off and into the lava, making John go flying and crashed into the stands, leaving a hole where he impacted.

"JOHN!" I yelled, then soon anger and adrenaline surged through me as I stared at Shellshock, glancing up to Joseph, then the robot.

Time to scrap this asshole

"NOW!" I yelled and charged at Shellshock. Joseph quickly activated the Omnitrix and a quick glow of green emerged, soon a little white and black floating alien with green lightning emerging from it appeared.

**"****Buzzshock!"** a tiny high pitched voice said as the creature zipped around in green bolts. Shellshock looked around for him, and thankfully he didn't notice John's wrench being picked up my yours truly and threw it at Shellshock, managing to knock out his gun, leaving him defenseless for me to deliver the kill. I was close to stabbing him, but my shoulder suddenly ached again and caused me to slow down a bit while I gripped it and felt blood pour out the stitch that opened up.

Shellshock noticed this so he quickly grabbed my bad arm and hoisted me over and slammed me to the ground. I felt my shoulder crack and pop out, causing me to suddenly feel pain rip through my body.

"Eww…" mostly everyone said. I yelled from the pain and held my shoulder, writhing in pain from the swing. Shellshock hovered over me and had his gun in his hand, getting it while I was down.

"Heh, night, night puny human," he said and aimed it at me. I looked but soon saw a blitz of green lightning and knew that Joseph had come to save me. That's when I had an idea, and Joseph seemed to think the same, since I charged at Shellshock, somehow my arm snapping back into place. Joseph whizzed right in front of me, and I shot my good hand into the green electric current he left behind, causing my arm (as well as my body armor) to get shocked.

"What the hell is he doing?" Joanne wondered aloud.

"Something stupid…" Ethan mumbled.

I thrusted my hand forward, my intent clear on ramming it through him as my visor began to become all screwy with me. I soon rammed my arm right through Shellshock's chest from the opening that had been there during the fight, probably shrapnel, sending electrical waves through our bodies, causing us to yell in pain. Well, I was more yelling like those guys in anime I watch do just to look cool. I soon grabbed something inside Shellshock and smirked, my visor already getting a crack from the pressure and electrical surge.

Shellshock however was currently being fried from the electrical surge, his visor and systems were going out of control, core systems were malfunctioning left and right, also his internet browser history was getting deleted. There went all his cyber poker matches and hours playing FPS games out of boredom.

I ripped my arm out of Shellshock, holding some mechanical thing in my hands as the robot toppled over with a loud thud.

"That…was for Nabrilloth you sick freak…" I croaked, crushing the device with my hand then letting it drop to the ground with a loud 'thud'.

I panted heavily and retracted my helmet, unable to breathe in that thing, as I looked at what I had held in my hand. It looked like some kinda circuit for the mechanical soldier, hard to tell, I'm not a mechanic. I held my hand up in the air, showing off my prize with a grin on my face as everyone cheered and chanted our team's name.

This. Was. AWESOME!

It felt like we were gladiators who just won a match in the Coliseum, we waved and all high-fived each other happily.

"Excellent works humans, I'm surprised you even beat Shellshock like that….then again, he was old for his age…" Alistair said as the Holovision appeared, showing his mug.

"As a reward, here is the Avenger armor, as well as a medal for the next tournament, and the all-expenses paid vacation to Capo Luna for you and your team," Alistair said as a robot delivered the armor plating, a blue medal to start our next campaign, and the passes for our vacation.

"Oh and while you're enjoying your vacation, you aren't allowed to go off planet, we have eyes and ears so don't try anything, but enjoy yourself and relax…'cause next season's gonna have tons of action," Alistair said as the image of the director flicked off on the screen.

I growled softly from that statement, using us for sport…sick. But as I looked at the medal, I sighed a bit, relieved we managed to beat Shellshock…but…now I thought of how strong the others were and how we had to fight them someday…that and I killed someone. I mean, yeah, I had to kill other people, but…this was the first time I killed someone on my own choice.

Can I ever wash off the blood…or oil…or whatever these people had running through their veins, off my hands?

"Hey come on Mark, we gotta go get ready!" Joseph called as he and the others were heading to our suite. I nodded and ran after them, ah well; guess I'll do something about it when the time comes.

I smiled a bit as I walked to the gang, but suddenly I heard a groaning and gasps, Joseph turned behind and froze, "Look out!" he yelled and pointed behind me.

I turned around, seeing Shellshock rising, despite the hole in his chest that should've destroyed him. I froze, my mind was racing as I saw the robot aim an arm to smash down, I shut my eyes and flinched, waiting for the pain. Instead all I heard was a clang of metal hitting metal and looked, his face full of rage suddenly froze, then went blank as suddenly he toppled over off the tower's edge.

I ran to the edge and watched the robotic sergeant fall into the acid pool below us and melt, I felt bad for him in a way, until his eyes looked up and as his face was being disintegrated, his hand soon clenched and turned to 'the finger' before the acidic lava consumed him.

"Well…that was anti-climactic" John shrugged after a moment of silence that befell the arena.

"But who shot that wrench?" Ethan wondered.

* * *

><p>The Omni-wrench that had been used to destroy Shellshock whizzed through the air like a boomerang and was caught by its owner, who looked from the shadows and stepped out, revealing his form of a cat-like creature standing beside a small robot companion.<p>

"I can't believe this guy brought back Shellshock, we destroyed him last time, how'd they even bring him back?" the cat wondered.

"I do not know Ratchet, but I am glad those humans are unharmed for the most part" the robot stated, "I must say though, to tear out Shellshock's core through all that armor, that Mark fellow must be strong, right Ratchet?" the robot asked.

"Yeah Clank, but no human could pull that off without the armor, he should've considered himself lucky" Ratchet replied.

"However, I am curious as to why there Earthlings were chosen, their planet is on the edge of the Milky Way, some thirty thousand light years away from here, the only known thing about Earth is that it's the home of Ben Tennyson and his family" Clank stated.

"I know Clank, why did Blackwell choose these guys?" ratchet looked as he watched the humans walk away happily with their victory.

"Perhaps they seem to act much like us when we were in Dreadzone?"

"Yeah back when Vox ran it, but this Blackwell guy is way worse" Ratchet stated.

"And that Mark fellow, maybe it would be a good idea to talk to him and his team?" Clank inquired.

"Well yeah, but maybe on one of those planets, Clank, think you can hack Blackwell's systems?" Ratchet smirked to his robot friend, who nodded and smiled back.

"Done and done" Clank replied.

* * *

><p>"You think he's one of them?" Alistair asked Fenrir as the two watched Team Terraforce's leader running to his friends.<p>

"Hard to say…but perhaps…you sensed his power correct?" Fenrir asked him.

"True…did they get the footage?" Alistair asked.

"Yes, they are going over it with the others, as for our…contestants for next season…its going well, they have no idea what's going to happen when they find out," Fenrir said.

"Excellent…now then..." Alistair looked over some dossiers and found two that interested him.

"Hmm…get these two boys on the phone for me…" Alistair said to the voice box on his desk to his personal receptionist robot.

**"****At once sir"** the robot answered. Alistair looked at his robotic arm and checked over some deigns and planet ideas for the second season, when he got a message, quickly pushing a button, the image of a silhouette of a person appeared, another window opened as several more silhouettes appeared.

"**Alistair…we are to begin the collecting soon, I trust you have the planets we want all picked out?" **A distorted voice said.

"Of course sir, here," the director said as he sent the data. "I trust you'll end up fulfilling you're end of the deal?" he asked.

**"****We shall, you will receive your shipment as scheduled, as long as you give us the technology"** the voice stated.

"Good, and this time send me more than just the scraps ok? I want the meat" Alistair ordered.

**"****As you wish, oh, add some of them to your second season of Dreadzone…and put team Terraforce in them…I want to see what they're made of,"** the voice said before the silhouette disappeared.

"Well, time to get to work," Alistair said and clapped his hands together. Fenrir seemed to have a sickened look on his face, well more like a scowl actually.

"What's with the face?" Alistair asked the Loboan.

"Nothing…" Fenrir muttered to himself. Fenrir didn't want to speak of their plans, hell, no one did, and they were all scared of the plans their boss made. No one knew what Blackwell had planned, and many didn't want to know.

Alistair glanced at Fenrir, "Get the Exterminators so we can try and go over the game plan for next season, also, make sure the prisoners are accommodated and kept fed, we need them alive. Also upgrade their quarters, they need better living conditions" Blackwell stated as he swerved in his chair, letting Fenrir walk out of the office. Blackwell went through the dossiers of the planets, smirking to himself, this season was gonna be his biggest yet!

Especially with what they were going to be fighting this year.

* * *

><p><strong>Achievement(s) Unlocked:<strong>

**Shock and Awe- Defeat Shellshock on any difficulty (Bronze)**

**Avenger- Completed the Avenger tournament (Silver)**

**And thus, the boss fight is over. Wasn't that fun huh? Well, next chapter is the vacation one, so get ready everyone, its beach time! **

**R&R please!**


	12. Vacation

**Ok, sorry for the wait everybody, but here is the filler chapter, but not just any chapter, the swimsuit chapter everyone has been waiting for! Hurray! also happy Turkey day everyone, enjoy the day where you stuff face, also for Black Friday/ Cyber Monday deals, hope they are good.**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 11: Act 1-Capo Luna (Vacation)<strong>

Man, Capo Luna was AWESOME! It was a beautiful planet with islands, beaches, resorts, and the ultimate vacation paradise. It looked like the back of all those postcards with the tropical theme on them, but real.

Anyway, after we beat Shellshock I had my shoulder treated, but everyone was surprised once my arm snapped back into place and after examination there wasn't anything wrong with it, even after a specialist examined it. Still, I wanted to rest my shoulder so I eased on my tasks of packing and stuff like that.

The team was ecstatic for a vacation, I didn't blame them, after everything that happened, and we could use a break. So we were free to do whatever, except we had on the collars and we were supposed to return to the hotel we were at before it got dark. Asides from that we enjoyed ourselves when we got on the planet. It felt strange though, we were on a vacation planet so we expected tons of tourists, well, we were right as the beaches had all assortment of men and women of all types mingling and enjoying themselves.

Our hotel was something like a five-star hotel, as a treat for passing the first tournament, and there was gonna be many more to come if we kept winning. Typical, give someone a reward and expect them to comply with killing innocents...ah well, might as well enjoy it all right?

Right now I was busy getting a tan going on…Mmm, the sun really felt well on my body; maybe a massage after this wouldn't be so bad, really would help with my complexion. It was too hot for armor anyway.

I opened an eye slowly and looked around, John and Frankie was busy eating something, Joseph was in the shallow waters, not wanting to cramp his leg, Chris was swimming a bit out there…I think (I couldn't see to well)… Zach was chatting with some chicks…(figures) and had dyed his hair black…how I'll never know…and Luna and Christine were…well…where are they anyway?

I felt something lick my face and thought it was somebody's dog, but when I looked it was a wolf with the same color as Luna's hair, that's when I realized it was Luna's wolf form and remembered Wolfens can go into a wolf mode whenever they want. I smiled and petted Luna's head, the Wolfen wagging her tail happily.

"You must really love that form of yours huh?" I asked her with a smirk.

"No duh…" Luna said and licked my cheek again then took off. I looked at where she was going, then decided to not bother and resumed my tanning.

"Hey mark" I heard a familiar voice coo and looked to Christine's direction and...oh my god.

I kept wondering what she wore under all that armor, I mean I knew her figure was grand, and her outfit she wore when out of the armor showed it off, but the two-piece bikini practically showed off everything about her. the bikini, a smoking hot red and grey color that somehow complimented her hair and tail colors, left little to imagine. Ok, as a conservative man, I should admit I am very shy exposing skin in public, and also I am really, and I mean REALLY, shy around girls, its the typical 'if you see a hot girl you say dumb stuff' rule. Here I was in a pair of trunks, black, and there was the smoking hot bakeneko girl in a bikini, what did I do?

Simple: I muttered something then looked away blushing.

"Heh, aww someone is shy" Christine purred, petting my head and sitting down next to me. "don't mind me I just needed the sun, and before you ask, I already added suntan lotion while I was changing" she stated and laid down on her back.

Well there went the cliché 'apply suntan to women's back while she moans as if aroused' moment. I nodded and laid back, enjoying the sun while trying to ignore the hot girl next to me, and my hormones screaming at me to make a move with her.

Ever since I met Luna and Christine my hormones have been skyrocketing, I knew that they probably had a thing for me, maybe they were teasing me, or maybe they genuinely cared, it was hard to tell. Luna warmed up to me after a while, she kinda reminded me of my dog back home a bit, only less bossy, thank god, I had to deal with one dog who thought she was queen of the house, I didn't have the patience for another.

Christine meanwhile...I felt there was something there...maybe it was just puppy love or something, but I liked when she showed up, she always made me smile at times. and given that I think too much into the killings we've done, I well enjoy it.

After a few minutes I decide I had enough of a tan and got up, deciding to cool off back at the hotel room, maybe watch some TV.

"Heading to the hotel?" Christine asked me while I got up.

"Yeah, wanna join?" I inquired.

"Nah I'm gonna catch some rays" she replied and resumed her tan. Shrugging I got up and went back to the hotel, dodging past the crowded beach from the beach-goers everywhere.

Just when I got up to walk off, I bumped into a man, I stumbled a bit, "Ow, sorry sir" I apologized as I looked at the man closely. The man himself had a healthy tan on him, a series of slight scars on his body, showing he was a warrior…and human looking by his features, minus the slight horns on his head. His skin had a slight dark yellow pigment to him, probably from the sun tanning or maybe it was just his natural coloration, his eyes were a sky blue, and I think he had a tattoo on his shoulder, but it was hard to tell from my angle.

"Oh, sorry, I was too busy enjoying this good day to notice you, again I am sorry" he said in an English accent. Guess English is the galactic basic language or something

"Oh, no problem, I'm mark, that is Christine" I introduced ourselves; Said catgirl looked up at him, tilting her head curiously.

"The young leader of Team Terraforce and the infamous member of the Twin Claws team, truly it is an honor to meet you, I am Solaris, wanderer of this vast universe" Solaris said.

Solaris…that name sounds vaguely familiar…if he has a symbol of a sun on him then I'm calling that he's Solaire from _Dark Souls_ but his future descendant.

"It's nice to meet you Solaris, hope one day we can meet each other again" I said to him as we both left, glancing back at Solaris who waved us goodbye as we departed. While it was nice to meet another person who was…slightly human at least, still, I feel like we will meet each other someday. Or my head is being cooked by the sun, well time to get inside to cool.

I did just that…well…Luna was beside me in her wolf form, she actually looked like and acted more like a dog than a wolf…guess this is how they were able to blend into society that way…hmm…makes you think.

I now started to wonder just how many Wolfens blended in with humanity on Earth…the thought of it kinda scared me really, but I decided not to question it and reached my room that I shared with my brother, Joseph and John. Luna wanted to share with me, since we were in the same bed together since she joined the team…and just to clear things up, the only thing I can think that we did was just cuddle…and sometimes she was in wolf mode I think…unfortunately we couldn't risk friction between the team so we went separate rooms. Luna and Christine bunked together...next door to us...with only a door separating our rooms together...meaning I was within five meters of a potential undressing and possible beat down.

That didn't stop her from joining me from time to time when it was just us though. I have yet to see Luna in her bikini, don't think I will yet, call me jealous, but I didn't want other guys oogling at her, only I could. I glanced down and blushed, praying she didn't see my tent growing as I tried calming down. You'd think after all this I would probably have fans, well we did, when we first got off we were swarmed with fans holding posters saying "Terraforce Forever" among other things. It was nice feeling liked by fans, we were like celebrities…now we just gotta not do something to screw us all up.

Luna curled in my lap when we got to the room and I petted her while lying down on the bed, man, this reminds me of home where I would play with my Maltese, Angel…thinking of her made me feel a bit homesick. I hoped everyone at home is ok…and that they're cheering us on and hoping we'd come back safely.

"What's wrong?" Luna asked as she sat down in her human form, looking at my expression curiously.

"It's nothing…" I told her.

"You're worried for everyone back home aren't you?" Luna asked with a hint of concern in her voice.

Dang it, she knew how to read me like an open book.

"It's that obvious?" I sighed.

"Yep, very obvious…" she said with a little smirk on her face. I sighed again and laid on the bed, tired a bit…and hungry.

Wanting to change the subject I looked at her, "Hey Luna, are you hungry?" I asked her. Her wolf ears popped up as did her head, showing she was indeed hungry. "Hmm…what to eat…what do you feel like eating?" I asked her, sitting up and going to the phone to order room service.

"Maybe something seafood related?" Luna inquired.

"Sure" I said, dialing up room service, few minutes later we were now eating seafood together, this might sound weird, but eating this seafood (which looked a lot like the food on earth) it felt like we were on our first date. I looked at Luna and smiled, she did the same and tore off a crab's leg, eating the meat happily. I love crab meat…anyway, after eating, I laid on the bed and Luna crawled beside me, rubbing her head on my chest.

A small smile formed on my face as I petted her, the soft breathing coming from her signified me that she was asleep. I carefully put her in the bed and walked out, I walked to the elevator and waited as it went down, I felt bad for leaving her alone like that, but I needed the air to think.

Plus I didn't want to piss my brother off with my constant pacing around the room, I did that whenever I thought of things. I went past the main lobby of the hotel we were staying at, I looked at the sky and noticed it was getting late, normally my instincts would tell me to stay inside, but something told me to walk out in the dark for a change. I had my hands in my pockets as I walked along the boardwalk, thinking heavily on things.

Can I forgive myself for all the killing we've done? Will society accept us back? Will we go back home safe and sound? Who will se us as the friends we knew, or will they see us as monsters? So many questions buzzed in my head, and sadly, I didn't have the answers.

I heard the sound of a can hitting something and glanced my eyes to a can rolling by my foot, looking behind me I saw no one, so I walked…only with someone following me. I walked in a normal pace, knowing there were assassins behind me, and quickly made a turn into an alley and walked to its end. Yeah I know its at rap but...I can't resist the atmosphere of the place.

"Come out…I know you're there…" I said coldly and turned to face the two hooded assassins before me. I glared at them, but grinned when I could tell who they were.

"Hey Richie…Kenny…" I smirked when the two emerged.

"How…how the fuck did you guess right?" the first assassin said as he threw off his hood to reveal Richie's face. Said kid had brown hair in as pike on the front with his eyes hidden by glasses.

"Wasn't that hard, so I guess Blackwell and his friends got you two to kill me?" I asked them while crossing my arms over my chest.

"Yeah, they're paying big cash for your head, but we're joining just to kill you," Richie said and charged at me. I then noticed he seemed…slower…like he was running in slow motion, I dodged all his moves and attacked back, leaving scratches on him. Then I grabbed his arm, hoisted him over my back, and slammed him against the ground.

"Dude, did you just get beat by Mark?!" the second assassin asked, in another voice I recognized.

"Yeah, he did…Kenny," I said to him and charged at him. The former-friend of mine was surprised by my speed and soon I punched him, the fact I improved my strength in my hands was good, as it made it easier to punch his mouth and caused blood to come out. I managed to send him stumbling into a pile of trashcans, causing a lot of noise.

"Is that all you two kids got?" I snarked back. I felt stronger, confident, I wasn't strong on earth, I had to deal with people like these two picking on me...no more...now it was time for payback.

Richie attempted to lunge at me, but I smirked, dodged out of the way and elbowed his face, then punched his gut and kneed him against the wall.

"Did you two actually think you stood a chance against me now?" I laughed as I grabbed and punched Kenny's face, "I've done a lot of training since I got on this gameshow,an di can say this: You two are gonna die!" I yelled, slamming Kenny into a trash can and slamming the lid on it.

The noise also masked the other assassin, whom I forgot temporarily until he attacked me from behind and I soon ended up unable to get up from him hitting me in the back of my neck.

"Ow…dude no fair…" I gasped as I turned my head slightly to get a look at them.

"We don't play fair, now shut up and die…" Richie said as he and Kenny prepared to stab me. I closed my eyes, I knew this was the end…but…I didn't want to die like this! The sounds of fighting forced my eyes open, I was awake? How? I looked again and saw my two former friends battling someone; he had a sword and was fighting off the two assassins.

It was Solaris, but seemed different than normal…his movements were fluid like water; even trying to follow his moves was a challenge on my eyes. Suddenly I saw Solaris slam Richie against the wall and punch him in the face, then flipped Kenny and kicked him into the alley. Solaris soon helped me up and I dusted myself off. I watched Solaris grab the two, dump them into a dumpster, then kick it down an incline towards the ocean.

Heh, so long jerk wads!

"Solaris?! How'd you…how'd you find me?" I asked him.

"Your yells and the fighting sounds led me here," Solaris said. I smiled a bit at my new friend, glad at least for a random person's help, even if I didn't want to admit it publicly.

"Guess I owe you Solaris, but did you really hear us fight?" I asked curiously to the warrior.

"Mostly I was out admiring the night, as I had the feeling it would be a good idea to go outside tonight. It would appear my intuition was right," Solaris said then had a hand on my shoulder, "It appears our paths are intertwined, some may call this coincidence, I believe in fate, be careful though, I suspect you have many more challenges ahead of you," he stated prophetically before turning and walking away into the street, "have a good night" I heard him say as he disappeared.

I blinked a bit, what did he mean when he said that? As cliché as it sounded, I felt…a weird sense of familiarity from what he said. Maybe it's the paranoia from my near assassination, but I feel like those words have some meaning. One thing however made me feel bad: how easily I let them get me. I was too overconfident,too stubborn, but I wanted to relish in the fight more, a part of me wanted to let all the rage I had collected over the years from them both and just...destroy them.

I know it is wrong, but given my history with them...letting go was out of the question.

Maybe we WILL meet one day, who knows? I better head back to the hotel, hearing my collar beep a bit made me hurry back to the hotel before it stopped beeping once I got inside. Sighing with relief I got inside and went upstairs, sneaking back into my hotel room, mentally praying Luna didn't hear me and nearly kill me for scaring her.

I peeked inside, seeing Luna was fast asleep in bed and snuck inside, going to the shower to clean up from my fight. Mentally glad my days in the coliseum made me more acute to my fighting, I changed and went back to bed, yawning as I soon drifted to sleep.

* * *

><p><em>The smell of ash and charcoal filled the air, skyscrapers crumbled around the city in bits, ash blanketed the ground as if were snow. <em>

_Amidst the ash covered city were figures, people running, hiding, in various poses and expressions, frozen still like statues, a remnant of what they once were, frozen in time forever._

_One figure walked the streets, his steps labored, smoke clogged his lungs, yet he felt fine, the clinging of chains echoed through the silent city. The figure stopped at a ash statue, a boy clinging to his mother as they attempted to escape their deaths. His fingers, white, clammy, reached out and poked it. The statue crumbled into a pile before him. Heavy eyes hidden under a hood looked down, sad...broken, regretful and pained._

"All that remains...is ashes..."

* * *

><p>"Magister Tennyson, are you alright sir?" Rook Blanco asked Max as the magister was busy looking at the monitors in Plumber HQ on Earth.<p>

"Not really Rook, I got a call from our agent, Mark nearly got killed by two of his old bullies, I guess Blackwell hired them to kill him," Max explained.

"Assassins? Magister, with all due respect, we should go in and, how do you say, kick the butt?" the Ravanigander stated.

"You need to think, if we do that, Blackwell will terminate those kids with those collars on their necks until we can get them off" Max explained.

"those collars, I read about them, slavers use those to intimidate the other slaves, if they go out of line, a quick press of a button and, well, as Ben would say, 'end up everywhere'" Rook explained, with an emphasis on the last part given by his arms expanding outwards.

"Besides that, its too risky, we need to find a way to get into the systems on that station to deactivate them" Max typed some codes in as a schematic of the station appeared, "good thing I added that bug to the systems, once I'm inside, I can use the systems from here to try to find a way to deactivate the collars" the magister said.

"I only hope by then it's not too late" rook muttered as the two heard an explosion and saw Ben coming out, coughing and smelling like burnt skin.

"Ok, well, the wonder twins tried to hack that collar we stole from Blackwell's stash…and it blew up" Ben stated as the two Galvan techs emerged.

"Working on it is difficult, Blackwell designed this to make it durable yet strong and tight" The rounder one of the duo explained.

"Might take us a while to crack it without blowing up more of the base…or the collars" the overalls wearing Galvan stated as he tossed the remnants of the collar away.

"On second thought, they're doomed" Rook bluntly stated.

Max sighed, getting those kids safely out of there would be harder than they thought, not to mention everything going on in earth was also taking his time away from saving them. He was glad Blackwell has the decency of giving them that vacation, it gave them time to rest, and mark was able to give them a message.

The Magister was still thinking about the contents of that message: 'Max, I need you to get some people off Earth fast, mainly my family and friends, you just need to trust me when I say this, I got a feeling something bad is going to happen soon. Think you can do this for me? See you soon, Mark'

"I got a bad feeling he's got something planned…but maybe he's right, getting some humans off world would be useful, even if we might be bending the rules a bit to do it" Max stated as he looked at a monitor.

"Perhaps he suspects Blackwell has something planned for Earth and is making sure he doesn't have any leverage to use against the team?" Rook suggested.

"Could be, but just to be safe, we better do what he suggests, and keep to ourselves about his folks" Max stated to the Ravanagander.

"Agreed, if he ever found out, who knows what he'd do" Rook mused.

"Nothing good I'd bet..." Max responded cryptically.

* * *

><p>Blackwell glanced at the two teens, sighing with disbelief.<p>

"Let me get you both right, you both tried to assassinate my newest rising star and his team, because you didn't like him?" Alastair asked the two teens from Earth.

One had short brownish hair that looked to be in a royal straight cut, collar on his neck, and holding a mace. His clothing was, well basic, given they were both wearing prison clothes. His compatriot was a speckled teen with sandy blonde hair, also having the dreadlock collar on his neck.

Blackwell arrested those both when he found out he tried to assassinate Mark in the alley, the collars has chips built in to show where the gladiators were at all times.

"Well, we managed to find a ship, smuggled our way on it and to that planet, then decided to kill him there while he was vacation," the brown haired teen explained.

"And you hate him?" Blackwell interjected.

"Well, he's…annoying to say the least…he wanted to kill him" the blonde pointed out his comrade, "I just went with it".

Blackwell was both disgusted yet pleased, not only did they smuggle themselves on the ship, but they also tried an attempted assassination. Needless to say, he was impressed with their desire.

"Ok, normally I'd tried to kill you both…" he began, swirling his chair so the back faced the boys. "However…you both gave me an idea, I need foil characters for the show, a team that could be like an antithesis for Team Terraforce, and I am willing to offer you both the chance to be that team," he swerved to face them at the last part.

Both teens looked at each other, surprised, but also hints of greed flashed in their eyes, prospects of money and power flashed in their heads.

"We'll do it" they both stated.

Blackwell laughed and shook their hands, "Alright, once I got two more competitors ready, you and your team will be set," he said, shaking their hands eagerly, "Welcome to the family!" he grinned.

* * *

><p><strong>Well seems this vacation just got a turn for the worst huh? Well, it is gonna be going downhill from here. anyway R&amp;R plz<strong>

**Achievement unlocked:**

**Well earned vacation...NOT!- Complete act 1 (Gold)**


	13. Into the Oven

**Well, after another break, here comes the next chapter, now here is where the story kicks off, hope you all were reading up till now.**

* * *

><p><strong>Act 2- Sages<strong>

_"Vesuvius, a molten pile of Earth that is home to Rainier's species, I didn't get much chance to talk with them at all, what with everything trying to kill me. Though I did find something interesting. Though if I knew what I found was so powerful, I wish I hadn't taken it. Well, guess there's no going back now."_

Audio Log...6 I think, Vesuvius, Mark I.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 10: Act 2- Vesuvius (Into the Oven…)<strong>

_The ashes were everywhere, the smoke rose into the skies, blocking out the sun, screaming was heard echoing through the city._

_People ran, scared, running as a demonic roar echoed through the city, a huge shadow flew over them, its wings brought storms, its shadow flanked everything, covering all in darkness._

_On top of a tower, a figure overlooked the carnage, a volcano in the outskirts of the city exploded, sending lava and volcanic material into the city, blanketing the outskirts with volcanic ash._

I...did this...

_A humanoid looking dragon fell as he ran, trying desperately to get up as something jumped and impaled him, then proceeded to devour him._

It's all my fault...

_A man garbed in power armor walked forward to a dying tiger alien, the tiger growled in defiance before the knight smashed his heel into its face, crushing it, then let out an unholy scream as the fire behind it surged._

_A humanoid creature emerged from the fires, its body charred and blackened by its suffering, and it screamed with the knight as everything burned._

What...have I done?

* * *

><p>I gasped awake, sweating, heart racing, palm sweating and stomach churning. Another nightmare, I thought buying that dream catcher on Capo Luna was supposed to work to suppressed or get rid of bad dreams?<p>

I sighed, then looked and realized I had my hand pressed hard on Christine's back, making her whimper.

I pulled my hand away as the catgirl woke up, groaning.

"Ugh...Mark? what's wrong?" she asked, rubbing her eyes groggily, mewing.

"Nothing...just a nightmare" I muttered, feeling the blanket stir as Luna's tail popped from the other side of the blanket followed by her.

"You were thrashing again, I thought when we agreed to sleep together, you agreed to stop thrashing" Luna huffed.

Incase anyone is wondering why I got these two in bed, first: no I did not sleep with them (although it feels like we did), see the reason they're bunking with me was the fact their rooms had a bug problem we were currently taking care of, so they agreed to bunk with me.

The guys teased me for having 'two hot ladies in bed' but I didn't want to do anything to them...not unless they agreed with it of course. Joseph called me 'gay' for missing this chance, I called him a 'pervert' right back.

Its not that I do like the girls, I do, but it's the fact I got my own bad experiences with women. I don't wanna say, but...lets just say I was really glad I left Earth for more than obvious reasons.

Sighing, I climbed over the girls and went to the bathroom to change and shower. The vacation was worth it, fleeting, but worth it; However I knew it was fleeting, just made me wish we could all leave.

Now I got these nightmares to contend with...just what are they telling me?

* * *

><p>Vesuvius, if there was any planet in the galaxy that could be best described as a living hell, this was it. Vesuvius was a giant molten lava planet, the only source of land were continent sized areas of cooled rock that were surrounded by oceans of lava and volcanoes that spewed more lava into the land, causing the continents to shift constantly and break into smaller chunks and islands.<p>

The only inhabitants were lava creatures and Vesuvians, living creatures made of molten lava and cooled rock, similar to what Rainer was.

"Ah, another great day for a new season for Dreadzone Z, wouldn't you say, Joanne?" Josh asked to his co-commentator, noticing she wasn't next to him.

"Joanne?" he called as a robot assistant walked to him and handed him a datapad, which he read over.

"huh, it appears she's been locked in a frozen meat locker and will not come out due to…" Josh squinted his eyes a bit as he kept reading, "…'not wanting to ruin her hair…'" he looked at the camera, shrugged and tossed the datapad aside, muttering 'women…' under his breath as he did and then turned to the main camera broadcasting.

"Hello every-body, and welcome to Season 2 of Dreadzone Z, last season we had some incredible competitions, which ended with the season finale in which Team Terraforce, led by a group of teenage humans from the planet Earth, defeating Shellshock in the Vindicator tournament. Now we are on the planet Vesuvius, this giant molten death trap will have our gladiators forced to trek the molten wastelands of this continent, fight through the native wildlife of this world, reach a pair of speeder bikes that Blackwell Industries graciously donated for this cause, and make it to the transport for evacuation." Josh explained.

"And now, here joining me is my back-up co-host, Ethan!" Josh said and gestured to the chubby human beside him, who was wearing a short-sleeved dark blue shirt and shirts.

"Thanks Josh, yes Vesuvius is going to be one dangerous place to be right now, especially since the land constantly changes due to erupting volcanoes and tidal waves of molten lava, our contestants will have to survive not only nature, but nature's offspring in this challenge world" Ethan explained.

"Wow, that's a big improvement from what you said before Ethan, glad to see you humans are pulling your weight" Josh smiled to the Terran.

"Thanks, oh and look here are the competitors now," Ethan pointed to the Planetary Transport as it glided into the planet and hovered over a small island of rock and dropped off the competitors, three of whom were of Team Terraforce, consisting of Mark, John, and Zach.

"Man, this place is like an oven!" Mark panted from inside the suit as he felt the atmosphere of the planet from even inside it.

"Thank god we got AC in here," John stated thoughtfully as he switched the AC on in his suit to keep him from overheating.

"Yeah, by the way, where do we go now?" Zach asked as he looked around for any indication to the path they had to take.

The holographic arrow in our HUDs appeared and pointed forward, showing a small image of the speeder bikes we needed to get to...

...Over a freaking chain of plateaus and small islands of cooled lava rock, that were being sunk and replaced every few minutes.

"This isn't going to be easy is it?" Zach asked, concerned for his own safety, as were we all for ourselves.

The ground began to rupture as we heard a hissing sound and saw the island we were on was breaking apart!

"Son of a bitch! Run for it!" I yelled to the gang as I went and jumped to the nearest island and began to run for dear life. The others followed my lead as they leapt off to my spot and we booked it to the other islands, the ground broke apart as if made of sand, sinking into the lava, taking the other gladiators down with them.

"Oh now this is what I call a barbeque!" Josh said excitingly as he watched the competitors get burned alive in the lava.

"In a sick way, this is kind of fun" Ethan smirked as he watched another contestant fall and boil in the lava.

"Just wait till they see the native wildlife of this world," Josh muttered as the human team managed to jump away from a collapsing island, with John getting hit by a rising pillar of lava that quickly turned into cooled rock.

John rolled off, tumbled down, and landed on the island the others were on. "John, you ok?" Zach asked as he helped his friend up.

"Y-yeah, just got sucker punched by lava…" John grunted as he got up with Zach's help.

I felt my stomach grumble as I smelt burnt skin, it reminded me we don't get to eat lunch, only breakfast.

Now I want chicken

"Let's keep going, we stay any longer this place might try to eat us or something" I stated as I kept on walking ahead.

"Gee thanks for your concern oh fearless leader!" John called back to me, which I smirked at.

Unfortunately the lava began bubbling over the edge, then something crawled out and into the ledge, the lava began cooling down, showing it to be a large, muscular creature made of cooled magma with orange lines along its body like cracks and glowing orange eyes.

"Whoa…run for it!" I yelled and booked it, as did my team mates. The beast roared and smashed its fist onto the ground, causing the island to split itself in two and forcing us on two different sides as one sank below the lava.

"Not good!" all three of us said as they looked and dodged the creature trying to smash their faces into the ground.

Using the momentum, Zach slid and began firing the Dual Raptors, augmented with the Freeze chip of course, and began firing at the creature's shoulders and knees to try and slow it down. John went on the offensive and began bashing it with his new gauntlets, the Mega-Fists as we called them, managed to chip away at the creature's armor, plus the ice that had formed on it caused more pieces to chip away.

I quickly changed my gun daggers into their sword form and took aim, waiting for the chance to shoot its weakness…wherever it was.

"John, move!" I yelled as soon as I got a glimpse of a dull rock core that was probably its heart, and took fire.

John dodged the blast, the camera doing a _Matrix_ bullet time move as the bullet went and shot the creature's heart, causing it to stumble and fall over, the lava stopped glowing as it signified its death.

"Whoo! That's what you get when you mess with us!" I cheered happily.

Unfortunately, once that creature was dead, a bunch of other creatures rose from the lava, one looked like a legless winged bat, another like a lava lizard with a seriously sharp tail. And they all were glaring at us, apparently for killing that golem creature.

"uh….Run!" I yelled and made a break for it, as did the others, with the lava creatures hot on our tails.

"Does this planet really want to kill us?" Zack yelled as he jumped over a crack that was splitting the island in two again.

"I guess so!" I replied as I ran for dear life, then noticed the speeders.

"Speeders!" I shouted.

"Get on and start driving!" John yelled as he jumped onto his speeder and revved it up, as did the rest of us.

"Ok Mark, you've played a lot of Star Wars games to know how to use a speeder…and a pod racer, just relax and hit the ignition, "I told myself as I revved up the speeder…and accidently went backwards.

"Damn it! Had it in reverse!" I yelled, feeling embarrassed with myself as I switched it to drive and drove off with more lava creatures charging at us. A few nearly got me, but after some accelerating to get away, I was safe, and now tried and catch up with the others.

"Hurry up before those things get you Mark!" Zack called out from the front. Sometimes, I hated when that happened when I was always the one left behind, especially in situations like this.

I gripped the throttle and sped up to catch up to the others, when suddenly the ground below was cracking and splitting. Zack and John managed to cross it before it split; unfortunately I was stranded onto the other side.

"Ah shit!" I yelled as I looked around for a way to cross, seeing a jutted piece of earth that looked to be like a ramp.

I saw the rush of the lava creatures and nearly shat myself, "Dude, just jump!" I heard John yell. I sighed and revved up the throttle, aiming at the ramp, then looked back at the torrent of creatures, waiting for the right moment.

"And he's revving up…still revving…the lava creatures are closing in, it's gonna be close!" Josh monologue as he watched the events unfold. I gulped and let the brake go, feeling the wind rush through my ears and the gap closing before I tilted the speeder up and was sent flying over the crevice.

"WHOOO-HOOO!" I yelled in glee as I made the jump and quickly caught up with the guys.

"Come on slowpokes!" I grinned under my visor and drove off ahead of them.

"Guy jumps a crevice and suddenly thinks he's pro" Zach mumbled with a smirk as he followed their leader.

The three soon found the large volcano and saw the shuttle hovering above the crater.

"Anyone got the feeling we gotta go through the volcano to get out of here?" I asked, sounding annoyed.

"Looks like we gotta go through the volcano to get out of here" Zach stated.

"I just said that!" I cried out.

"Oh really? I didn't hear" Zach apologized.

"I bet you didn't" I mumbled and looked for a way inside the volcano, suddenly the ground began caving in and I let go of the speeder, grabbing the edge of the cliff before it began crumbling.

"Mark!" John yelled as he and Zach ran towards the cliff before the ledge I was holding on gave way and sent me falling to the lava.

"MARK!" they both yelled.

"Oh my, he's falling, he's going to die!" Joanne said excitedly as she leaned up to the glass to get a closer look at the leader's imminent demise.

"Shouldn't someone help?!" Ethan stated, obviously worried for his friend's safety.

"We can't, we're not allowed to interfere with contestants lives" Josh replied, though he too was worried for the young terran, he couldn't show it though.

"Well if we don't do something, he'll die!" Ethan yelled.

* * *

><p>I was falling down the chasm, feeling the heat of the lava grow hotter as I was growing closer to the river of lava below me.<p>

_'This is it, I'm going to die…wow, I guess I would've been the first one to die on the team, just like everyone said'_ I thought as my life flashed before my eyes.

Time seemed to slow down while I was falling, if I had known I'd die right now…or anytime from this crazy game, I'd have tried to been nice, and do what I wanted to do before I died.

"Guess this is it…later world" I mumbled, closing my eyes as I awaited for the end.

* * *

><p>Inside a dark cave, something stirred inside it, an eye opened, revealing a dark yellow eye with slit pupils opened.<p>

_"__Come forth…child of man…"_

* * *

><p>I snapped my eyes open, looking around as I felt like someone was calling me.<p>

"What the…" I mumbled before I felt ground hit my back, my breath escaping from the impact as I groaned.

"He's alive!" I heard John call out from above.

"You ok?" Zach called down.

"Fine!" I yelled, rubbing my rear and back as it throbbed, "In pain…but fine…I think I see a passage from here! I'll see if I can meet you inside the volcano!" I called out.

"Ok, good luck!" they both said, before they left I realized something and called out.

"Hey, did you guys hear someone just now?" I asked.

"Uhm…no why?"

"Nothing" I shrugged, figuring it was my imagination as I walked into the cave, hoping it lead to the volcano.

"Argh! What will it take to kill him?!" Joanne screeched as she nearly tore her hair out from frustration.

Ethan and Josh just sweat dropped and looked as the view of one of the camerabots followed the leader of the team in the cave.

"Wait…were…those hieroglyphics?" Josh asked as he took out a remote control and looked through the robot's lens, seeing that in the darkness, there were hieroglyphics in the walls.

"Creepy…" Ethan mumbled as everyone looked at the glyphs.

* * *

><p>I looked at the glyphs and traced them with my fingers slowly, they seemed…familiar…Egyptian maybe?<p>

"Why would a place that's basically the interior of a volcano have these?" I wondered as I looked around, "This…this wasn't natural…someone built this place for something…but what?" I asked myself, and then looked at the camera bot that was following me.

"I don't suppose you can translate?" I asked it half-expecting something could be done.

The robot just looked and shook its head at me.

"I figured as much…" I sighed and continued walking down the corridor. While I walked I began to get the sensation I was being watched by something…and no not the trillions of aliens watching me, something…else…something…ancient.

"Ethan, are you there?" I called into the comm. for my friend.

_"__Yeah, I'm here, but where you are…I don't know, it's not on the map,"_ Ethan said as he watched his friends on two monitors in the blimp.

"Joseph, where am I? Can you make any sense of this?" I asked him.

_"__Kind of, these glyphs are ancient, but they're definitely alien, as for what they're saying, it's a rough translation but I can make out 'elements', 'sages', 'medallions' and 'darkness', but that's all I can get"_ Joseph explained.

"Well that's better than anything I guess…" I shrugged, then began feeling woozy, "ooh…what the…what did I eat?" I groaned as the world swirled around.

_"__Mark? What's wrong?"_ Joseph called, his voice sounding distorted and far away, like he was whispering from far away…or something was dulling down the voices.

_"__Come forth…child of man…"_

"Wh…what?" I groaned, trying to look forward despite the wooziness I was feeling.

"Did you hear that?" Ethan asked, wondering if he was the only one hearing what he thought he heard.

"Hear what?"

_"__Come forth child of man…enter my domain…"_

"…Ok tell me I wasn't the only one who heard that?" Josh asked, hearing the voice as well.

"No I think I heard it too, but...what was that?" Joanne asked, concerned now.

I followed the voice, figuring it knew a way out, against my better judgment of course, but I've had to make quick decisions lately since I got on this game. I followed, seeing a light at the end of the corridor and rushed to it, stopping and stumbling when I saw the room.

The room itself was a large, open air pit, lava falling down into the inside, smoke billowing from the lava below and platforms and walkways that seemed to lead to other parts of the pit, looking up I saw what looked like the shuttle, and realized.

"Zach, John I'm inside the volcano!" I cried anxiously.

"Wow, I owe john ten bucks, we're coming out of a tunnel you see us?" Zach asked. I searched and found the two in a tunnel just close to mine.

"I see you!" I called and waved my hand to show where I was.

"Meet you at the top?"

"Sounds good…did you hear that voice earlier?" I asked him again.

"Voice? what voice?," Zach asked.

Huh…why couldn't they hear it like me? I shrugged, "Never mind" I replied.

I looked around and went forward, trying to head to the large platform in front of me…which was strange since I didn't see anything keeping it up other than lava below.

When I reached the platform I froze and stared up, as did my friends, but hey you would too if you saw a giant 20ft. statue of a dragon in front of you!

"Holy…damn" I muttered as I looked at the statue, its claw upward, as if holding something. I went forward and looked at the claw, surprised to see a medallion in its paw and looked at it.

Upon closer inspection I saw the medallion was a red orange and had the imprint of a flame, and then a small lightning bolt and what looked like a gust of wind on the corners of the flame.

"Sweet" I said taking and pocketed the medallion before the entire place shook.

"What's happening?!" I yelled and stumbled on my back, the others were struggling to stand up, though it gave us the best view for something extraordinary to occur when we saw the statue's eyes' flash red.

_"__At last!"_ we all heard the voice shout as the area rumbled more, the ceiling threatening to cave in. The statue dragon clenched its claw, as if coming alive after a long time, and lowered its head to stare at us, but more at me.

_"__At long last…I've waited…for the next link in the endless chain to arrive"_ it spoke, still staring at me.

"'next link'? You…you mean me?" I asked the statue...dragon…thing.

_"__More than you know…child of man…many years have passed since I last spoke…holding the medallion I was given by the Great Sage…until I sensed your arrival…"_ it looked at the collar and poked it, my body stiffening and stumbling in fear.

_'Strange...he reminds me of the last sage from Earth'_ it thought, glancing curiously at the boy.

_"__You're chained…chained to this…accursed game…yet your flame is still strong…but…tainted by anger…grief…rage…if left unchecked...it will consume you"_ it said slowly.

"I'll take my chances" I mumbled coldly.

The dragon chuckled, a deep throated one that shook the room, "_Humans…never cease to amaze me…"_ it said as it began rolling its neck, the stone parts of it chipping away as it revealed the dark red scales under it.

"whoa…" I heard Zach whisper as we saw the dragon in its true form, wings outstretched and staring at us in all its majestic beauty…what? I like dragons.

"_Aah, much better, that stone was such a pain on my vocal cords"_ the dragon said, rubbing his claw on his neck and cracking it a bit from side to side. It looked down at us again, though without the stone it looked...younger.

This dragon though, I looked at it closer, it scales still had a shine to it despite being in stone, but it...made me feel nostalgic.

_"__You now have the medallion, speak my name and my power will be yours"_ it said, sniffing the medallion I held.

"How?" I asked it, confused as to what it meant.

_"__You will know…"_ it spoke before an explosion stopped us and we looked at the gaping hole to reveal a large golem made of lava and rock.

**"****Sorry to disappoint but I'm running low on time and we need to wrap this up"** Blackwell's voice called from our comms.

**"I've sent this lava golem I got from the Vesuvians to help dispose of you kids, sorry but that's how it is, get him!"**he ordered as the golem roared and jumped on the platform, then reared its fist to attack us.

"Run!" I yelled and we all dispersed as the golem began to attack us, while I was trying to look for a weak spot on it while dodging its fists.

"I can't hit it!" Zach yelled as he shot at the rock-armor skin of the golem, the bullets not doing a thing to it.

"Oi, dragon, can you help?" I asked the dragon, who was watching us fight from a perch.

_"I cannot, until you speak my name"_ it said calmly.

And to think I thought dragons were badass…

The ground gave way around me as the ledge I was on caved and split, causing me to fall, again I might add, towards the lava. Once more it was slow-motion as I gripped the medallion in my hands, as if by a miracle something could happen to me to save me.

I closed my eyes and shouted out loudly, "IGNEOUS!"

The dragon's eyes changed from the yellow they were to red, then leapt off the platform he was on and grabbed the boy, _"I am here…"_ it said simply.

I looked up at it, realizing the name was Igneous, and grinned, "Your name! It's Igneous!" I called to the dragon.

It nodded and looked up at the golem, _"Now we fight, hold on"_ it said, forcing me to grab its spike on its neck before it charged at the large golem, grabbing its shoulders and lifting it to the sky, dropping it off onto the ground with a loud crash.

"Eat that!" I yelled at the golem before it got up and raised its hand to blast a ball of fire at us.

_"Hold on!"_ Igneous called as I gripped the spikes for dear life and the dragon twirled, dodging the large fireball, though I felt the heat from it as it passed us, just before the golem grabbed the dragon's tail and brought us down.

I let go and skidded onto the ground, dazed and dizzy from what just occurred, my body aching all over from the stunt.

"Ooh…oh god that hurt" I groaned as I got up to see the golem's large foot suddenly stomp in front of me. I looked up, skin paling from seeing how huge it was.

"Oh god…oh shit!" I yelled as I stumbled to escape it's grasp before it grabbed me in its large, stony lava hand and glared at me with its large glowing orange eye.

"Uh guys, help!" I hollered as I struggled to escape from the golem's grasp, to no avail unfortunately.

The golem's hand began clenching me, sending waves of pain through my body and causing me to yell in pain. Now I knew how Goku felt when he was squeezed by Giant Ape Vegeta in DBZ…good times. I began to think about my life before this, they say life flashes before your eyes before you die, for me, it was like that.

_'Someone, please help, anyone…please?'_ I mentally cried out as the pain was becoming too intense for me to take and I blacked out.

* * *

><p>Joseph was busy typing on the console, watching with the rest of the team in horror as Mark was being gripped to death by the golem.<p>

"If Alastair could create a lava golem, then we got to get them out of there somehow" he muttered.

"Joseph, send us there to save Mark!" Frankie called as he tried to make it to the transporter, though was stopped by Joseph.

"No way, we'll get fried if we go there" he replied.

"We need to do something!" Frankie said before an idea popped in his head, "Wait, ice!" he exclaimed.

_"T__hat's it, we use ice to kill it down enough to get Mark free and then kill it!"_ Zach replied over the radio.

* * *

><p><em> "D<em>_o it, we only got one chance"_ Joseph responded.

Zach nodded as he got out his Twin Vipers and switched the chip to the ice mod, then blasted the golem's arm, causing the rock to harden and soon caused the golem's arm to stop moving, then broke up, dropping their leader into a rubble pile.

John ran to Mark while Zach and Igneous held the golem off long enough to give John the chance to get Mark.

"Got him!" John called as he hauled Mark over his shoulder while Zach blasted the golem's glowing eye, causing it to try to rip the ice off, distracting it enough to give Igneous the chance to attack.

The dragon slashed and clawed the golem's shell, molten lava spilling onto the ground as he slashed off the legs, then stomped its head repeatedly until there was just rubble. Igneous panted as he grinded his claws on the rock, then roared loudly to the sky, triumphant. After calming down he went and sniffed Mark, who was still out cold from the pain.

_"He's hurt bad…"_ he muttered, poking his snout on the boy's chest as John felt Mark's body heat up, _"This should help for a bit, healing some of the damage to his organs, he'll need medical attention though"_ the dragon responded.

"What about you?" John asked the scaly beast.

Igneous smirked before he erupted in flames and the flames swirled around and into the medallion, _"__I shall remain here, he is my quarry, now I am bound to him," _he responded in the teen's heads.

The two teens looked at their friend as he woke up, panting heavily, "Oooh...What hit me?" he asked with a small smirk on his face.

"The golem nearly did man, your dragon friend saved you" Zach explained as he helped his team leader up.

"But…where is Igneous?" Mark asked before the medallion began to glow.

_"__I am here, inside the medallion, you will be safe from fire damage now, and can call upon me for back up if needed,"_ the voice of Igneous spoke to me.

"Ok…thanks man, so how do we get out of here?" I asked, looking at the landscape around us, seeing our bikes were gone, or trashed by the golem.

"Ok looks like we got some difficulties for our team here, and just in time for the volcanic eruption to occur too!" Josh said as the volcano erupted moments later.

Looking back and seeing a giant volcano erupting and the ground breaking apart, I thought of only one thing:

"RUN! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, RUUN!"

Yeah I basically yelled that to my team, nearly breaking eardrums, and booked it from the platform, trying to get to a relative safe island. Sadly, that was gonna be a problem, as the islands around us were cracking apart, like the planet was ending, which I thought it was.

"Well, we're probably gonna die, anyone got any last words?" Zach called.

"Yeah: IGNEOUS!" I shouted as my medallion glowed bright in my hands as our floor gave way .

Ten seconds later my faithful companion shot out of the breach we were just in and into the sky…or…lack thereof.

"Mark, your new powers, seriously rock!" John said, latching onto a spike for dear life as Igneous dropped us near the evac shuttle before going into the medallion.

I nodded, exhaustion hitting my system, the running, shooting, and using my new medallion powers took its toll on my body. That and my asthma kicking in, making me wheeze and gasp for air as the shuttle bay doors closed and we jerked forward towards the Planetary Transport Ship, also didn't help as I tumbled against the wall.

"Yeah…so….so good" I gulped, trying not to dry heave.

I needed water…air…oh man, this wall is so cool…just might…take a little nap here…zzz.

* * *

><p>"ARGH no fair! Those boys cheated!" Joanne yelled and ripped her papers in frustration, foaming at the mouth a bit.<p>

"Yes…" John took a step back, "Though, this is getting interesting now, since we just saw a Sage return" he replied.

Ethan shot him a quizzical look, "What's a sage?" he asked

Josh gave the 'Are you serious?' look then realized and smirked, "Oh right, your from Earth, you're new to this. Well, the short story is that the sages are people who can control the elements, you know Fire, Water, Earth, Wind and Lightning." he explained.

"Oh, so the medallions act as a focus then for the sage?" Ethan inquired, interested in the discussion.

"Yeah, each medallion had the power to choose who best fit the qualities of the medallion, no sage was the same, it was said these were handed down for centuries, kept hidden on planets who exhibited the most of an element, Vesuvius best fit for Fire, for example."

"So there are others?" Ethan inquired.

"Yes, some even said there was a sixth, one to control shadows, but this was too dangerous, and was split into five pieces. Scatter all over the universe, to ensure no one could find and reassemble it," John explained as he pulled out a computer tablet, then showed various images of drawings with the medallions and sages taken from old ruins.

"Legend spoke of a group of acolytes who had become sages and even reunited the medallion, the sage of fire of this group severed his dark side to let it become the sage of shadows. But something happened that made the medallion shatter again, some believe the other sages split their dark sides form themselves, then put them into their respective fragments, no one knows, but many tried to reassemble it..only to have the darkness devour them" John clicked another picture, showing a medallion being reassembled, shadowy demons emerging to devour the one who assembled it, then showing the poor soul being a part of the shadowy group.

"Creepy…but it's just a myth I bet…right? "Ethan asked nervously.

"Who knows, but I did get a degree in Xenomythological studies once in my school days, so I can say that legends always have a kernel of truth to them," John spoke.

"Anyway, that's enough talk, what horrors will Team Terraforce go through next? Will one of them die? Will Joanne finally get anger management classes?" John ducked when his counterpart chucked a chair at them, causing it to fall out of the skybox, smash the window, and burn in the lava.

"Find out on the next episode of Dreadzone Z! Joanne, Joanne put down the axe! Joanne?! Run for it she's gone crazy!"

The sounds of screaming men and robots follows, the camera tipped over before going to static.

* * *

><p>"Remind me to get Joanne a raise for anger management classes…" Blackwell mumbled, shutting off the TV in his office as an assistant robot scurried over to him.<p>

"Sir, the latest polls…" it squeaked and waited for its master's response.

Blackwell looked at the ratings, slightly lower than normal, but acceptable, he even noticed a rise with Team Terraforce's popularity.

"Those kids are a hit, guess when the Exterminators go broke I'll use them, speaking of, how are my new robots doing?" Blackwell asked the droid, tossing the manifest at him.

"Well sir, it's going great, the Iron-Maiden Reapers are going faster than we hoped, with work on the soldiers complete, though their abilities are going through some tests first, but rest assured they will be ready with the augments to use parts of their fallen brothers to compensate for their brittleness, with luck we may be able to get them to enter new forms as well" the robot explained.

"And _it_?" he inquired.

"At 50% completion, it'll churn out more of the soldiers and hover bots, not to mention the scythe wielders, and won't cost you a dollar," the robot said in an optimistic tone.

The lion grinned and chuckled, "We got to thank those humans for the schematics, crude they may be, but also our…informant, for giving us an extra edge on them," he grinned. He hadn't chosen those teens simply because he wanted to…ok maybe he did, but also he figured some might be useful, new blood, teenage blood at that.

"Speaking of our informant, he has a call for you" the robot said.

The lion nodded and pushed a button, letting the robot whirl away as the screen soon showed the silhouette of a male, a human from the looks of it, though voice distortion software made it difficult to know the identity of the informant.

**"****I hope that the information was worth it?"** the voice asked.

"You bet, those robots will soon be under my payroll and I'll have my own army, you did great work going through those kids stuff when we kidnapped them," Blackwell smirked.

**"****Don't forget our deal…"** the voice stated darkly.

"Yeah, yeah I didn't, you just keep digging for any info, got it? Otherwise you'll be answering to more than just my lawyers," he threatened.

**"****I won't fail you…"** the man stated before flashing off screen.

"You better, unless you want the Plumbers on you…assuming the kid doesn't get to you first…" Blackwell mumbled as he looked at a video footage on a tablet, smirking to himself. When making a deal, be sure to have blackmail material handy…just incase.

* * *

><p>"So, it appears that the first sage has been found" a woman spoke, staring at a lake, the image reflected in was of Mark, and his medallion.<p>

"Yes, but will he be our salvation? Or our destruction?" a second woman spoke, standing next to her companion.

"Only time will tell" the first replied cryptically, "...only time will tell..."

* * *

><p>The man walked through the landscape of Vesuvius, to where the volcano erupted, he looked at the remains of the golem, scoffing, a waste of material for a power hungry fool.<p>

He stopped, looking down, seeing a black shard on the ground, he picked it up, wiping the ash from it, revealing a flame symbol on it as it pulsed and glowed.

**"Rise...Tyrant of Smoke and Ash..."**

The ash and darkness soon erupted from the fragment, compacting, molding into a humanoid form.

Metal boots gently fell onto the ground, the shadowy figure of a man was before the wielder, the smoke and ash made it difficult to look difficult to see what the man's identity was.

The shadow man looked up, red eyes shining from amidst the darkness clouding him, it groaned, as if trying to speak, but had the intelligence of an animal.

**"Come...We must go now...the time for the Tyrants...has arrived"**

* * *

><p><strong>Achievement Unlocked-<strong>

**Too Hot to Handle- Complete Vesuvius (Bronze)**

**Well, now we get to the good stuff, leave a review, it's greatly appreciated**


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